


A Kind of Magic

by orphan_account



Series: Enchanted Worlds [1]
Category: Princess Tutu
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-24
Updated: 2013-06-24
Packaged: 2017-12-15 23:55:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 61,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/855438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU fic that uses the world of Diana Wynne Jones' The Chronicles of Chrestomanci novel series as a setting. The position of Chrestomanci, which is used to govern the use of magic in the Related Worlds and prevent its misuse, is only given to nine-lived enchanters. A young orphan girl named Ahiru seems to be the latest candidate for the title...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Once upon a time, there was a girl who died.

Unlike most people, however, she did not stay dead, which was what made her so unique.

But that was getting ahead of things.

In all other aspects, Ahiru seemed to be a perfectly normal teenage girl, if a bit small for her age. In actual fact, she was far from ordinary, though none who knew her at the Lakeside Orphanage would have guessed that merely from looking at her. All they would have seen was a diminutive wisp of a girl with a bright red braid that was nearly as long as she was tall, a giant cowlick that refused to be tamed, wide blue eyes, a dusting of freckles across her nose, and a smile as warm and sweet as her general disposition.

She had been in the care of the orphanage for roughly five years; prior to that, her uncle had had custody of her. Both her parents were long dead, her father having perished before her birth and her mother having died in the act of giving birth to her. Her uncle had stepped in immediately to take her in after her mother’s passing, and had raised her alone. But five years earlier, events he had not seen fit to discuss with his scared young niece had necessitated entrusting her care to the orphanage. He’d promised her that he would return soon, but as there had been no sign of his continued existence, he had been officially pronounced dead and thus Ahiru became a ward of the state. That time was nearing its end, though none yet knew it.

The end began on a day seemingly as ordinary as Ahiru herself. Everyone had just had lunch, and all the older children had been shooed out of the building to play outside while the younger ones napped. It was a bright summer day, with the sun high in a rare cloudless sky, and cool breezes to balance the warmth. Autumn was fast approaching, and so it was likely to be one of the last such days in the near future. The children seemed to know this, and set to playing outside with even more enthusiasm than usual. Many of them took to scaling the tall, shady trees that dotted the yard, and some of the ones who were inclined to bully Ahiru over various characteristics of hers decided to dare her to join them, expecting to be able to taunt her as a wimpy crybaby scaredy-cat when she predictably refused. Ahiru was not feeling predictable that day, though, and decided to be brave and take up their challenge. It was a decision more momentous than she knew at the time.

The first portion of her climb went slowly and somewhat steadily – she tried her best not to look down as she climbed ever higher, and closed her ears to the taunts and jeers of those who felt she was not ascending the tree quickly enough for their liking. Unfortunately, her refusal to listen to them also meant she did not hear the warning about a weak branch from a girl genuinely concerned for her safety, and it proved to be her downfall. Even her slight weight was enough to be the last straw for the branch, and she went hurtling back down to earth at a far faster rate than she had been climbing up. Later, she would be unsure of just how fast or slow she had perceived the fall to be while it was happening; her vague memories of it consisted mainly of a mass of screaming voices, one of which might well have been hers. She wasn’t sure about that either.

What was certain was this: her memory of the event ended when she hit the ground, her fragile neck snapping in an instant, too fast for her even to feel. She never did hear any clear accounts of what happened past that point; for those who had witnessed her fall were afterwards too traumatized and terrified to do anything but shy away from her afterwards.

The gap in her memories ended at the point when she woke up in someone’s office a little while later. She could hear the sound of adults arguing outside the closed door, and though her neck was slightly sore, she otherwise felt as well as ever. She had been laid out on a lumpy sofa riddled with coffee stains, and there was a plate of cookies sitting on the desk nearby. When the arguing adults – one man, shorter and thinner than the taller, stockier woman – finally entered the office, they found Ahiru seated on top of the desk, calmly eating one of the cookies and swinging her legs back and forth.

The woman screamed. The man fainted. Shortly thereafter, the coroner they had called arrived, only to leave almost immediately upon hearing that there had been something of a false alarm and there was no dead girl waiting to be delivered to the morgue. The only thing that delayed him leaving was his own anger at having been called out apparently for nothing, and he ranted until red in the face about childish pranks and valuable time and people who had real jobs before getting back in his car and driving off in haste. The people in charge of the orphanage then called in a doctor, an older woman who was bewildered but kind as she gave Ahiru a thorough physical examination. She pronounced her to be the very picture of health, with nary a scratch on her from her fall, much less a broken neck. The shaken orphanage staff nevertheless fed her an early dinner separate from the other children and sent her to bed early.

News of the strange incident soon traveled outside the orphanage, and the result was that slightly over a week later, Ahiru was summoned by the matron in charge as she sat with the younger children and read stories to them. (She had always preferred their company to the older ones anyway, as they were kinder to her and did not tease her quite so mercilessly about her clumsiness or her cowlick or her duck-like voice, but now none of the older children wanted to be around her, so spooked were they by how she had seemingly come back to life after her fatal plunge from the tree.) She had, it seemed, a visitor.

“Now, I’m sure I don’t need to tell you this, but you be sure and be on your best behavior,” the matron warned Ahiru in a stern voice as she ushered her along to where her mysterious visitor awaited her. “You’re being paid a visit by a very important person, heavens only know why, and it would not reflect well upon us if you were to incur their wrath. Do you understand me?”

“Y-yes.” Ahiru gulped and nodded her head. “Who – who is it? Is it – it’s not my uncle, is it?”

“Oh goodness no, that man is…” The matron paused, stopping herself just short of telling the girl how very dead her uncle was presumed to be. “It isn’t him. This is a much more important visitor.” She opened the door to the small sitting room the orphanage used as a waiting room for visitors, and pushed Ahiru inside. “Here you are. Be good!”

“I –” Ahiru turned to ask her another question, but the door was shut in her face, and the footsteps that moved away from it were brisk and swiftly vanished out of earshot.

“You are Ahiru?” The voice was gentle, pleasant, and female. Ahiru turned to see the source of it. It was a tall, slender woman with pale green hair arranged in an impossible elaborate updo and a kind smile on her face. She rose from her seat and moved forward to touch Ahiru’s cheek with a cool, pale hand. “You are a lovely girl.”

“N-no, no, that’s – you’re really too kind!” Ahiru blushed bright red and shook her head frantically. “I’m not nearly as pretty as you are!”

The woman laughed softly. “You are sweet to say so.” She took Ahiru’s hand in hers, and her expression became more serious. “Ahiru, I am known as Chrestomanci. Have you ever heard of me?”

“Um, no.” Ahiru shook her head again. “I – I’m really sorry, but – but I haven’t.”

“That’s all right.” Chrestomanci considered Ahiru for a moment. “I understand that you have recently had an… unusual experience?”

“Y-yeah, I guess you could say that.” Ahiru gulped. “I – I mean – I don’t remember it really well, but I fell when I was climbing a tree, and everything went dark, and then I woke up in somebody’s office and I started eating the cookies on the desk and then when the adults came in, they freaked out and now none of the older children want to come near me.” Her eyes filled with tears. “Everybody says that I died and I came back to life and they’re scared of me, but that’s impossible. Right? I-I don’t understand it.”

“You will in time.” Chrestomanci stroked Ahiru’s hair with one of her cool, pale hands. “I cannot explain it to you right now, but the time will come. Will you wait for me?”

She didn’t really understand this any more than she understood what had happened to her that fateful day, but Ahiru nodded anyway. “Y-yes. I will.”

“Good.” Chrestomanci smiled again, and this time Ahiru noticed that there was a mysterious, almost otherworldly quality to it that made her feel at once both vaguely unsettled and yet somehow calm at the same time. “I will return soon; wait and be patient, for haste will in the end only bring regret.”

She left Ahiru then, asking to be taken back to the matron’s office, and Ahiru did not catch another glimpse of her before she departed the orphanage. It would be another week before she heard anything, and what she received was a letter apologizing that she could not come to retrieve her herself, and instructing her to pack up whatever possessions she had, as she was adopting her as her ward and would be coming to live with her and her family in her castle. Enclosed also was a train ticket, bound for a village called Gold Crown. Ahiru stared at the letter and the ticket for a good long while before placing her few belongings in her shabby suitcase, her mind in a daze.

For the second time in her young life, she was being uprooted without a clear reason as to why, and she did not quite know how to feel about it yet.


	2. Chapter 2

No one saw Ahiru off the next afternoon; the orphanage staff simply called a car for her and loaded her into it. Everyone had some excuse for not accompanying her to the station, and so she would have to find her train on her own. She worried that she would get on the wrong one, or be late and miss it, but by repeatedly asking the adults around her and rereading her ticket over and over, she managed to make it onto her train in just the nick of time. There weren’t many passengers aboard, so she got to sit next to the window by herself, her small suitcase resting on the floor beside her.

She watched the city she had lived in all her life disappear past the windows and melt into countryside she had never seen before. She watched trees and fields flit by, glimpsed farms and little villages and rivers. She listened to the names of various stops get called out, none of them hers. Eventually, the scenery outside began to blend together, and she grew bored and sleepy. In an attempt to stave off sleep, as she feared missing her stop if she dozed off, she pulled her book out of her suitcase. She turned first to the end, to look at where she had filled the once-blank pages there with various doodles, and then back to the beginning so she could reread it.

She read slowly, in fits and starts, easily distracted by the fact that she was also listening closely for her stop to be shouted out. At last, when she was maybe a quarter of the way into the book, “Gold Crown” was called out, and she hastily replaced the book inside her suitcase before making her way to the exit doors. Excitement at finally arriving at her destination coursed through her, only to rapidly fade as she left the train and realized that she had no idea where to go next. Her shoulders sagged as she stared around at the people coming and going around her, quite oblivious to her plight and indeed to her very existence. Had there been instructions in Chrestomanci’s letter about what to do when she got off the train? She couldn’t remember.

“Miss Ahiru?”

Ahiru stopped in the middle of fumbling through her pockets for the letter and turned to see the source of the voice. It was a tall, slender man of maybe thirty years old or so, with neatly groomed violet hair and a thin, whiskery mustache that stuck straight out on both sides. It made him look rather like a cat. “Y-yes, that’s me. Are – are you – did Chrestomanci send you to meet me?”

“Yes.” He fingered his mustache idly and nodded. “I am Mr. Katz. I will be your teacher at the castle; you will receive lessons from me with the other children.”

“N-nice to meet you,” Ahiru stammered.

He nodded again. “I am pleased to make your acquaintance as well, Miss Ahiru. Now, if you will follow me…”

“Y-yes!” Ahiru rushed after him as he took off through the station. She was well out of breath by the time he stopped beside a long, stately black car. He opened the door for her and she climbed in, practically falling inside as she tripped over her own suitcase. She barely had time to get herself situated and buckle the seatbelt before Mr. Katz had started up the engine and was driving off. She fell back against the seat as he took off, banging her head a little. She winced and rubbed the back of her head, the soreness reminding her uncomfortably of when she’d woken up in the matron’s office after her fall.

Nevertheless, she was able to relax a little, now that she didn’t have to worry about winding up in the wrong place. Ahiru closed her eyes as Mr. Katz drove through the village and then onto a bumpier road that curved upwards a little. She had almost begun to doze off when his voice roused her. “If you look now, Miss Ahiru, you will see Chrestomanci Castle just ahead of us.”

Ahiru obeyed him, leaning over to peer out the window at the enormous grey castle looming just up ahead of the car. Most of it looked quite old, but she could also see newer additions to it in places. Her mouth hung open as they drew closer and she got a better look at the turrets and the beautifully maintained lawn dotted with tall trees. She wasn’t as enamored of trees after her recent experience, but she had to admit that these were nice. Mr. Katz drove right past the main entrance to the castle, and parked near a smaller door that was almost obscured from view by a mass of oak trees.

“This is the door you’ll be using most of the time,” Mr. Katz explained as he turned the engine off. “I felt it would be easier on you if you were brought in this way so that you can begin to get used to it. I hope you don’t mind.”

“N-not at all!” Ahiru shook her head. “That’s – I think it’ll make it easier, thank you.” She hadn’t been looking forward to going in through the grand front doors and all the attention that would bring, anyway. It was a relief to be entering the castle more discreetly.

Mr. Katz simply nodded and exited the car. He opened her door while she was still struggling with the seatbelt, and took her suitcase from her when she finally freed herself. Ahiru followed him in through the little door to find that a tall, plump young woman in a maid’s uniform was waiting there for them. She had dark brown hair pulled into a severe bun, and a nose that was much longer than average, but her face was friendly and she smiled down at Ahiru as they entered.

“Ah, Miss Anne-Erina. Good.” Mr. Katz held out the suitcase to her. “This is Miss Ahiru. I must report to Chrestomanci, so please show her to her room.”

“Of course.” Anne-Erina took the suitcase from Mr. Katz’ outstretched hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Ahiru. Follow me, and I’ll take you to your room.”

She led her up a winding staircase, and Ahiru clutched the bannister tightly the whole way. She had yet to forget what had happened with the tree, and was terrified of falling from anywhere now. Stairs were included in that fear. At last, after what seemed like an eternity of climbing stairs (due partly to how slowly and cautiously she was moving up them), they reached the top, and Ahiru hurried to catch up as Anne-Erina headed down a lengthy corridor. Their footsteps were muffled by the thick carpet that had been laid down upon the stone floors, and the late afternoon sunlight peeked in from the small windows set into the walls. Anne-Erina moved past several doorways before reaching the one at the end. She opened the door and led Ahiru in.

It was a massive room, and Ahiru couldn’t restrain a gasp of surprise and delight upon seeing it. Straight ahead of her was a large, canopied bed hung with lacy pink curtains and made up with crisp white sheets; in the corner stood a huge wardrobe that had been painted with flowers and a pond, where a single yellow duck swam. There were bookshelves lining one wall as well, lined with various tomes, and on the far right wall was a gigantic window with a roomy window seat below it.

“Lovely, isn’t it?” Anne-Erina smiled at her again. “And through this door is your bathroom.” She opened the door beside the bookshelves to reveal a bathroom nearly as large as the bedroom, with floral tiles on the floor and a huge bathtub on clawed feet beside a modest-sized shower.

“I – I get my own bathroom?” Ahiru gaped at it. “But – but I’m just one person, I – I don’t deserve all this!”

“Nonsense.” Anne-Erina laughed. “You’re going to be a part of the family now, and that means you get only the best.” She walked back out of the bathroom and over to the bed, where she laid Ahiru’s suitcase down. “Now, do you need me to help you unpack this?”

“Oh – no – I can do it myself, thank you.” Ahiru shook her head. “I – I don’t have that much, and I’m sure you’re really busy with other things, so – so I don’t want to bother you. I’ll be okay. Thank you.”

“You’re very welcome. I –” She was cut off by the sound of a loud gong ringing from somewhere in the castle. “Oh – that’ll be the bell for dinner. Or rather, when you hear that, it’s to let you know that you have half an hour to dress for dinner. The family eats early on nights like these when there’re no guests, so that the children can dine with Chrestomanci; they’ll be expecting you in the dining room.”

“O-oh.” Ahiru gulped. “And – and where’s that?”

“Just go back down the staircase we took up here, and then turn to your right and down the second hall on the left, and it’ll be the third door down. Got that?”

“Um, yes. Thank you.” Ahiru nodded. She really wasn’t all that sure of it at all, but she figured that she could just ask someone else when she got down there. In a castle this size, there was certain to be someone around wherever you turned.

“Good. I’ll leave you to get changed and ready, then.” Anne-Erina curtsied to her, and then left the room, closing the door behind her.

Instead of immediately opening her suitcase, though, Ahiru took the chance to wander around her new room a bit. She was used to sharing a room with several other girls, and before that had been given a rather drab and shabby little room at her uncle’s house. She had thought his home enormous when she was younger, but now she saw that this castle dwarfed it by comparison. She peeked into the bathroom again, browsed the bookshelf, and took a good long look out the window. She could see the castle gardens from there, riotously colorful groups of flowers in neat sections and rows of vegetables, with what looked like vast orchards beyond. She didn’t know what she wanted to do more: explore the gardens, or simply sit in the window seat here with one of her new books.

She couldn’t do either right now, though, so with a deep sigh she went back to her bed. She sat down on it, and bounced up and down a few times on the mattress before standing up again and opening her suitcase so she could begin unpacking it.

“Ooooohhhh.” Ahiru jerked in surprise at the voice. She looked up to see that the door was open, and that a tiny girl with hair the exact same shade of pale, minty green as Chrestomanci’s was trotting eagerly towards her. “Are you the new girl zura? Mama said you were coming today zura.”

“Ah! Um, yes.” Ahiru nodded, beginning to recover from the surprise. “I –I’m Ahiru. It’s nice to meet you, um…”

“Uzura.” The little girl beamed up at her. “That’s my name zura. It’s nice to meet you zura.” She reached up and tugged on Ahiru’s skirt. “Are you going to be my big sister too zura?”

“Ah, well, I’ll –”

“Uzura!” This voice was male, and much deeper than Uzura’s. “I told you not to…” The voice trailed off as its previously unseen source appeared in Ahiru’s doorway and saw the scene within. Ahiru’s eyes traveled instantly to him as she heard the footsteps. He was a few years older than she was, and taller by quite a bit, with olive skin, dark green eyes, and long black hair that he’d tied back into a ponytail. Something flickered in his eyes as they looked at each other, but was gone in an instant. “Oh. You’re –”

“Fakir!” Uzura rushed over to him. “This is Ahiru! She’s going to live with us zura!”

“I see.” He looked down at Uzura with a stern expression. “You weren’t bothering her, were you?”

“Of course not zura!” Uzura said. “I was just talking to her zura!”

“Really?” He folded his arms and gave her a skeptical look. “Because –”

“Oh no, she really wasn’t!” Ahiru interrupted. She felt her cheeks grow warm as Fakir’s eyes met hers again. “She just – I think she just wanted to say hi. I don’t mind. And – and – um, it’s, it’s nice to meet you too. Fakir, right?”

“Hmph.” He returned his attention to Uzura, whom he scooped up in his arms as if she weighed no more than a feather. “Come on, you; it’s almost time for dinner. I don’t have time to be chasing you around the castle, and she still needs to get ready if she doesn’t want to be late. You’ll have to wait to talk to her.”

“But I want to talk to her now zura!” Uzura squirmed, trying to free herself, but his grip was firm.

“No.” Fakir shifted Uzura to balance her on one hip so that he could close the door behind them, giving Ahiru one last impassive glance over his shoulder before it shut. Feeling faintly dazed, Ahiru stared at the door for a minute or so after it shut, listening to Uzura’s pleas and Fakir’s refusal to budge to any of them. Was he one of the people she’d be attending Mr. Katz’ classes with? She hoped not, he was kind of rude. Uzura seemed nice enough, though, at least.


	3. Chapter 3

It was only after the noise had disappeared down the hallway that what Fakir had said registered: if she didn’t hurry up and get dressed, she was going to be late for dinner on her first night here. A panicked noise that sounded strikingly similar to a duck’s quack came out of her mouth, and she whirled back around to her open suitcase.

“Eeeeek, oh no, oh no…” Ahiru clawed at her hair a little before realizing that that would mess it up and frantically tried to smooth it back down. “I don’t have anything really nice…” She lifted what she could call her best dress out of the mess of slightly wrinkled clothes – for no one had helped her pack, and she wasn’t terribly good at folding clothes – and eyed it critically. It was a rather drab grey, its color faded from both the sun and many washings, and there was a frayed spot at the hem that made her cringe. But it was the best she had, so it would have to do. She dropped it back down onto the clothes pile and began to fumble with what she was wearing.

There was something about being in a hurry that only slowed you down in the end, though, and Ahiru discovered the truth of that soon enough. She was hampered more than usual by buttons and sleeves, her haste causing her to become tripped up by shaking, clumsy fingers, and she was near tears with frustration by the time she finally smoothed down the wrinkled skirt of the grey dress and made for her bedroom door. She only vaguely remembered the directions Anne-Erina had given her, and between having to stop to ask more than one person on her way and going agonizingly slow down the staircase, it was a minor miracle that she arrived at the doorway to the dining room just in time.

She skidded to a stop just outside the open double doors, relief spreading over her flushed and slightly sweaty face as she saw that nobody was sitting down and food hadn’t been served yet. She stayed there for a moment to catch her breath and look around at the small group of people inside. Chrestomanci was deep in conversation with Mr. Katz and an older man who looked close to forty, with light brown hair and a friendly face. Past them, she could see Fakir talking to a pretty, dark-haired girl. Ahiru glanced down at her own dress and then back at the other girl’s silky red one, and felt fresh shame wash over her. The girl’s hair was so lovely and neatly pinned up, too, with some locks falling artfully around her pale face, while her own was so messy after a long afternoon spent on the train, to say nothing of her untamable cowlick, and she hadn’t even taken the time to fix it. She sighed. Already she was going to make a bad impression, and it was made worse by the fact that it was the all-important first one.

There really was nothing for it, though, so she took a deep breath and walked into the dining room, trying to make her footsteps as quiet as possible and awkwardly attempting to pat her hair down again. She was acutely conscious of both her shabby appearance and the fact that she was the last person to arrive. She went unnoticed at first, to her relief, but then she caught Chrestomanci’s eye, and watched with some unease as she excused herself from her conversation and walked towards her.

“Oh, Ahiru, there you are.” Chrestomanci smiled and gently took her arm. “Come here, I want you to meet my other two wards, whom you’ll be receiving lessons with every day.” She led Ahiru over to Fakir and the pretty girl. “This is Fakir, and Rue. Dears, this is Ahiru, the girl I told you about. I’ll leave you to get to know each other a bit.” She flitted off then, back towards Mr. Katz and the other man.

“Hello, Ahiru.” Rue smiled warmly. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.” She elbowed Fakir. “Don’t you think so?”

“We’ve met already,” Fakir said, rubbing his side where Rue had nudged him.

“Oh?” Rue raised an eyebrow. “Then this should be like a reunion of old friends. Where’s your enthusiasm?”

“You’re ridiculous.” Fakir scowled. “I just retrieved Uzura from her room when she was running around before dinner, that’s all.”

“Oh, Fakir, I don’t know if you have any right to be calling me ridiculous.” Rue laughed. She took Ahiru’s arm and led her in the direction of the table. “Come, Ahiru, we’ll sit together at dinner and talk. Do feel free to ignore the grump back there.” Fakir glared at her back as she walked away with Ahiru in tow.

Rue sat Ahiru down at a chair directly across from one of the tall windows that looked out onto the castle gardens, and then sat down in the one beside it. “How do you like your room, Ahiru? I looked in when they were preparing it, and it looked lovely. I hope it suits you.”

“It - it’s really nice,” Ahiru stammered. She looked around nervously as the others took their seats – Chrestomanci at the head, Mr. Katz to her right, and the other man across from Mr. Katz. Fakir was the last to seat himself, choosing to sit across from Ahiru and Rue with his back to the windows. “I’m not really used to having a room to myself, though, so it might be a little weird at first.”

“That’s right, you came from an orphanage, correct?” Rue looked sympathetic. “I spent the first few years of my life in one too, I remember what it was like. As soon as I showed talent for magic, though, Chrestomanci snatched me up – so to speak – and I’ve been living here ever since.”

“O-oh.” Ahiru dared a glance at Fakir. “Um, what about you? Was it the same for you?”

“… No.” Fakir’s face was carefully blank. “After my parents died, Karon –” He nodded in the direction of the older man talking to Mr. Katz. “– brought me here because I had magical talent, and Chrestomanci adopted me.”

“Oh.” Ahiru’s gaze dropped to the table. “I – I’m sorry – I didn’t mean to – I’m really sorry.”

“Don’t be stupid, you couldn’t have known.” He shrugged and glanced away.

“Pay no attention to him, he’s just been in a bad mood for as long as I’ve known him.” Rue reached over and squeezed Ahiru’s hand under the table. “Which is since I came here, because he arrived not long before I did. Ah, here’s dinner, so that’ll be a good excuse not to talk to him, because all our mouths will be full of food.”

Ahiru turned her head to see that a group of footmen bearing covered silver dishes were making their way into the dining room. This too was something she was entirely unaccustomed to – at the orphanage, and at her uncle’s house prior to that, she’d simply been served her portion of whatever tasteless food the cook had decided to prepare for that particular meal. Here, though, she was expected to take whatever size portions she wanted of the steaming, deliciously-scented, and almost completely unfamiliar foods being presented to her by servants. She gulped nervously and did her best to serve herself a little of everything that looked good, and tried not to spill anything on herself or the expensive-looking white tablecloth.

“What do you think? Much better than you’re used to, right?” Rue took a spoonful of a rich white soup and sighed with pleasure as it went down. “I remember orphanage food, and not fondly.” She smiled at Ahiru. “You see, I never knew my parents – I was found abandoned and taken to a home for children like me. I lived there till I was six, and then I came here. I’ve been very happy here, and I hope you will be too.”

“I – I hope so too. I mean, it seems nice and everything, I just – I hope I can… fit in…” Ahiru bit her lip and poked at her roasted potatoes. “I don’t… want to be sent back to the orphanage or anything.”

“Don’t worry about that.” Rue took a sip from her glass. “Chrestomanci would never do that. You’re here to stay now. So try to settle in as best you can. And I’ll be here to help you if you need it, okay? Unlike someone I know, I care about welcoming people to the castle.” Fakir shot her a glare, but didn’t say anything. Rue merely smirked in response and returned to eating her dinner.

“Th-thanks.” Ahiru took a few more bites herself. The food was indeed really good – she especially liked the potatoes and the grilled fish. Everything was cooked perfectly and seasoned well, a nice change from boiled meats and bland vegetables. “Um, do you – do you know why Chrestomanci wanted me to live here? She hasn’t explained it to me yet and I don’t really get it.”

“I haven’t heard much about it myself, but I assume it’s because you have sort of magical talent that she feels is worth cultivating. Oh, that makes it sound so cold-blooded, but it’s really not,” Rue added hastily. “She took an interest in Fakir and me because we have talent, certainly, but she also genuinely wanted to give us a good home, and the same is true of you.”

“But – but I’ve never cast a spell!” Ahiru dropped her spoon into her bowl of soup, and a few drops of it flew onto the tablecloth. “Not even once! I – I’m just a regular person, I don’t have any talent! Not at all!”

“Oh, nonsense.” Rue waved a hand dismissively. “You’ve simply never had a chance to use it. Chrestomanci can tell these things about people. I’m sure whatever you’ve got, it’s just lying dormant in you waiting to come out.”

“How can she tell?” Ahiru tilted her head to the side.

“Some kind of special enchanter’s ability, I think.” Rue shrugged. “There’s witch sight, which we’ve both been trained to use, but Chrestomanci, she’s got some different kind of ability altogether.” She reached over and patted Ahiru’s hand. “I’m sure she’ll explain it all to you soon enough. Don’t worry about it right now, just enjoy dinner.”

“Um, okay.” Ahiru swallowed. She darted another glance at Fakir, but he was focused on his own food. He seemed to feel her eyes on him, though, and looked up at her. She looked away again quickly as their eyes met, and missed his puzzled frown. 

The rest of the meal passed in relative silence; Ahiru half-listened to the adult’s conversation from the other end of the table, picking up bits and pieces of it in between Rue telling her who everyone was. She learned that the Karon Fakir had mentioned was one of Chrestomanci’s most trusted employees and friends, a powerful magician in his own right who mainly worked with bewitched objects, whether to disenchant confiscated ones or to create them for other magic-users, and also did the castle blacksmithing. Mr. Katz was their teacher, as Ahiru already knew, and Rue related the gossip that Uzura’s nanny, Miss Goatette, was sweet on him, but alas, he was oblivious. From the adults, she overheard something about a smuggling ring dealing in illegal magical items that was beginning to have a resurgence in activity after a few years of relative quiet. Through it all, Fakir remained mostly silent, responding only when Rue decided to make a pointed comment that he didn’t feel like ignoring.

Finally, it was over, and everyone dispersed. To Ahiru’s surprise, Rue and Fakir followed her as she headed back to her room – it turned out that their bedrooms were along the same lengthy corridor as hers. She awkwardly bid them both goodnight as they went into their rooms, and then continued into her own. Her clothes and suitcase were still in a messy pile on her bed, so she put her clothes away in the painted wardrobe and shoved the suitcase under her bed before changing into her nightgown. She set her picture of her mother on her bedside table along with her book and the pendant she wore around her neck, and then took her only other possession – a worn and somewhat beat-up pillow in the shape of a duck – to the window seat, after dousing the light. She sat down in the dark, hugging the pillow to herself as she stared out at the castle grounds. The sun had gone down some time ago, and there was no trace of its light in the sky. Just over the orchard trees, she could see a sliver of the moon as it started its ascent, and myriad stars twinkled all around it in a brilliant web of silvery light that cast a soft glow over the gardens. She stayed there for a long time, just watching the sky and the still, silent gardens, until she began to nod off. Only then did she reluctantly stand up and draw the curtains, and climb into her waiting bed.


	4. Chapter 4

Ahiru awoke with a jolt the next morning. At first she thought that some kind of loud noise had awoken her, as sometimes happened at the orphanage when things were going on out in the streets, but she quickly realized that things were too still and silent for that. It was a bit like being draped in a thick down comforter of quiet, and not the eerie kind either – it was calm and peaceful. Yet, her heart was racing and she felt vaguely uneasy. Had she had some kind of bad dream? She couldn’t remember what it could’ve been about. Any memory of it had been lost the instant her eyes snapped open, but the awful feelings it had produced remained. Maybe it was better, then, that she couldn’t recall any of the details.

While she stared up at the canopy above her bed and tried to calm down, the door opened and Anne-Erina bustled in. “Good, you’re awake!” she said as she looked over at Ahiru. “I’ll run your bath for you, so don’t go back to sleep!”

Ahiru felt too unsettled to want to even if she could have, so she sat up, yawning and rubbing her eyes. She turned her head and stared out the window as she listened to the water running in the bathroom. After a few minutes, it stopped, and Anne-Erina came back in.

“Now, then, it’s all ready, so you go ahead and wash up and get dressed, and when you’re done I’ll take you to where you’ll be having breakfast. Your schooling starts at nine, so mind you don’t take too long in the bath, or you won’t have enough time to eat before lessons. I’ll wait for you outside, all right?” Without waiting for an answer, she bustled back out of the room and shut the door behind her. Ahiru blinked a few times, and then got out of bed and padded over to the bathroom.

She climbed carefully into the steaming water, careful not to let her lengthy braid get wet. She’d wash her hair after dinner tonight, when she had enough time to dry it all. For now, she’d simply undo and rebraid it after cleaning herself off. She washed as quickly as she could, and then exited the tub as carefully as she’d entered, not wanting to slip and fall and get hurt. She dried herself off in a hurry and rushed back to her room to dress and redo her hair.

As promised, Anne-Erina was waiting for her in the hall when she opened her bedroom door, and smiled when she saw her. “Good, good, you’re ready. Let’s go get you some breakfast, shall we?”

“I don’t have to – I mean, I’m not eating in the dining room?” Ahiru asked as she hurried to keep up with the older girl’s much longer strides.

“Oh no, nobody eats breakfast in there, unless Chrestomanci is having some sort of formal brunch for guests, and that doesn’t happen often.” Anne-Erina led her down the long corridor and turned a corner into a shorter one. “You and the other two will take your morning meals – and lunch as well, and dinner if there are guests – in here.” She opened up the first door they came to and stood back so Ahiru could enter first.

It was a large, airy room that somehow managed to be cozy despite its size. There were several squashy armchairs scattered around, a couple bookshelves jammed with books, some worn cupboards with toys peeking out, and a stone fireplace that wasn’t currently in use, but was probably very nice to curl up next to in the winter. There was a door at the back of the room, and next to one of the tall windows was a table laid out with dishes and silverware. Fakir and Rue were sitting there, both of them engrossed in reading, but they looked over as they heard Ahiru enter. Fakir merely stared at her for a moment with expressionless eyes before returning to his book, but Rue smiled and closed the magazine she’d been poring over.

“Good morning, Ahiru.” Rue waved. “Do come and sit down.”

“Good morning!” Ahiru smiled brightly back at her and hurried over to the table, while Anne-Erina followed her in, moving towards the dumbwaiter beside the fireplace. “What’s that you’re looking at?” she asked, sitting down in the empty seat beside Rue.

“This? Oh, just a magazine.” Rue held it up so Ahiru could see the cover – there was a pretty girl in a frilly dress on the cover. “I try to keep up with the latest fashions, even if we’re a long way from any big cities. Still, it’s easy to order things, and there’s a good shop in town that gets in a lot of nice things.”

“Oh.” Ahiru looked down at her own rather plain dress and fidgeted uncomfortably. “I… I haven’t really gotten to… I mean… I don’t know anything about clothes or anything like that.”

“If you’re interested, you can always ask me. I’d be happy to go shopping with you sometime. And you can always borrow one of these.” She indicated the magazine beside her.

“Really? Thank you!” Ahiru blushed. “I – I do need some new clothes… mine are awfully terrible compared to yours.” Her face fell again. “Though, I don’t know… I don’t have any money to buy anything, so maybe not…”

“Oh, don’t worry about that, Chrestomanci will buy you some, I’m sure, and you’ll be getting pocket money every week soon enough.” Rue held out the magazine towards her. “Here, why don’t you take it and look it over once lessons are over for the day? I’m pretty much done with it, so don’t feel bad about that,” she added as Ahiru opened her mouth to protest. “I insist.”

“Um, okay, if you’re sure…” Ahiru took the magazine from her and set it down beside her plate. “Th-thank you …”

“You’re very welcome.” Rue smiled at her again.

Ahiru would’ve opened up the magazine to begin perusing it, but just then Anne-Erina carried over a tray bearing their breakfast. There was a platter of scrambled eggs, a pot of tea, a bowl of steaming hot porridge, several slices of buttered toast, and a jar of marmalade. Ahiru shuddered a little – she had never liked the taste or smell of cooked eggs. She carefully ignored them and served herself some porridge and toast, generously applying marmalade to the latter. She noticed that Rue took some of everything, though she applied much less marmalade, while Fakir also avoided the eggs and spread nearly as much marmalade on his toast as she herself had. She was tempted to ask him if he disliked eggs as much as she did, but she was too nervous of him still to attempt casual conversation, and so focused instead on adding sugar to her tea. She wasn’t quite sure, on the whole, what to think of him yet. He wasn’t mean, exactly, but he also wasn’t really friendly, and was so cold and aloof that it was a bit intimidating.

She reached for another sugar cube at the same time that he did, and their hands brushed, causing the one he’d just picked up to slip out of his fingers. “Ah!” Ahiru drew her hand back hastily, as though she’d just touched a hot stove. “I – I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to…”

“Hmph.” He shrugged and retrieved the sugar cube and dropped it into his cup. “It’s not a big deal. Don’t get worked up over it.”

“I… mmmph.” Her face reddening, she waited while he added a couple more to his tea before reaching over again to get one last one for her own. She carefully avoided looking at him while she ate; she felt somehow mortified, maybe a bit out of proportion to what had just happened. Or maybe not. He was just so… she didn’t feel at ease at all around him. Rue was just as much of a stranger to her, and she felt a bit awkward around her too, but at least she was warm and nice. He, on the other hand, seemed to be made of ice or something. She wanted to ask Rue if he was always this grouchy, but it didn’t seem right to do so in front of him, even if Rue had felt free last night to needle him about his behavior. It would have to wait till she got a chance to talk to Rue alone.

They had just barely finished eating when the door at the back of the room opened, revealing Mr. Katz. “If you are done with your breakfast, then please proceed into the schoolroom for your lessons,” he instructed them. They each set down whatever they had been holding and hurried after him, Ahiru bringing up the rear behind the other two.

It was indeed a real schoolroom, even though there were only three small desks in there, arranged in a straight line across the dusty floor. It had a blackboard, and a globe, and bookshelves, a larger desk for Mr. Katz and even the familiar smell Ahiru remembered from the shabby little school near the orphanage that she had attended every day. To her dismay, Rue and Fakir each took up the desks on the outside of the row, leaving her to sit between them. She would have preferred to have Rue as a buffer between her and Fakir, but no such luck. She reluctantly sat down as Mr. Katz stalked up the length of the room to stand before them.

“I realize that it has been a long and lazy summer for you all, but I hope that you have not forgotten too much.” He eyed them in a way that made Ahiru want to sink down in her seat and hide, but neither Fakir nor Rue batted an eye; they were obviously used to him. He paced back and forth before them, and eventually stopped in front of Fakir’s desk. “I’ll start with you, Mr. Fakir. Before the rise of the Incan Empire, who controlled Atlantis?”

“The Aztecs.” Fakir sounded bored.

“Good, good.” He moved on to stand in front of Ahiru. “Miss Ahiru, please tell me the name of the sorceress who played an instrumental role in ending the Hundred Year’s War.”

“Um, um…” Ahiru squirmed. “I, uh… I don’t think my last school got to her… or maybe they did and I don’t remember… I’m not sure.”

Mr. Katz’ mustache twitched. “Miss Rue, then?”

“That would be Jeanne d’Arc, Mr. Katz,” Rue replied.

“Excellent, Miss Rue. And after the war’s end, what did she do?”

“She…” Rue paused for a moment. “She was offered a position at the royal court, and was instrumental in uncovering the magical crimes of her former comrade Gilles de Rais many years later.”

“Very good, Miss Rue. I see you have not let your head go empty over the summer.” He gave Ahiru a stern look. “Now then, if you will all open your history textbooks to page 400, we will begin. Pay close attention, Miss Ahiru, if you do not want to fall further behind.”

After they covered history, they moved on to geography, and then to mathematics, and then Mr. Katz set them to answering questions on a worksheet. Ahiru discovered to her intense embarrassment, when she stole surreptitious glances to either side of her, that her penmanship looked even more terrible when set in comparison to that of the other two. She cringed and tried to block her paper from their view as much as she could, even though it smudged the ink, because she hated the thought of either of them seeing what her handwriting was like. Fakir would probably give her a look of disdain, and Rue… Rue wouldn’t laugh at her, and might even offer to help her practice, and that was almost worse, because she already didn’t want to disappoint the older girl.

At last, just as Ahiru’s hand was beginning to cramp up, Mr. Katz told them to set down their pens because it was time for lunch. He disappeared through a door on the side of the schoolroom while they rose and trooped back to where they’d eaten breakfast. A plate of sandwiches and a pitcher of lemonade awaited them on the table, and they set to eating them eagerly.

“Ahiru, don’t be too afraid of Mr. Katz,” Rue said as she set down her glass. “He may be gruff, but he’s not so bad when you know how to deal with him. And you’ll catch up soon enough, I’m sure.”

“I don’t know why he expects me to know as much as you two do,” Ahiru mumbled, staring down at the crumbs on her plate. “I’m younger than both of you, so I haven’t learned all of the same stuff yet…”

“I don’t think that’s really occurred to him to consider,” Rue said. “He started teaching us both at the same time, and covered the same material, despite that there’s a difference in our ages too, so he got used to that… that you might not be caught up to the two of us in some subjects probably hasn’t crossed his mind. Still, I don’t think you’re so far behind that it’ll be a problem for long.” She frowned. “That might be different when you start magic lessons, though… you’ve never taken those, have you?”

“Um, well, my old school covered some basic witchcraft, but – but I was never able to do anything in it.” Ahiru hung her head, her face hot with shame. “I, um… I kind of… flunked it. I don’t know what I would have done if I were going there now, if they would let me try again or if I would have to just get left out and go do something else while everybody studied it and then they’d all laugh at me and…”

“Well, no one is going to laugh at you here.” Rue patted her hand. “And before you ask, no, not even Fakir. Frankly, I’m not sure he has a sense of humor to begin with, so even if he wanted to, I don’t think he could.”

Ahiru squirmed. “N-no, I – I wasn’t going to ask…” She was positive Fakir was glaring at Rue again, and she didn’t dare look up, even though she hadn’t actually said anything to irritate him.

“Oh, well, then just rest assured that you won’t be laughed at by either of us.” Rue drained the last of her lemonade and glanced first at their empty plates, and then at the door to the schoolroom. “Shall we? I’m sure we’re expected back by now, and we probably should try to minimize annoying Mr. Katz any more today.”

Ahiru murmured her assent, while Fakir simply rose silently and headed towards the classroom. When they reentered it, Mr. Katz was sitting at his desk with a glass of milk and a plate of cookies. He spotted Ahiru as she trailed after the other two and shook his head. “No, not you, Miss Ahiru. Please report to Chrestomanci’s study.”

Ahiru blanched. “Wh-what? What? Did – did I do something wrong? Why does she want to see me?”

“I wasn’t told why, only that she wanted to speak to you.” He took a gulp of his milk. “Make haste, Miss Ahiru, you should not keep her waiting long.”

“Ah, ah, um, okay…” Ahiru gulped. “Wh-where is it? I – I’ve never been there before…”

“What? Oh, of course.” He brushed a finger over his mustache. “Simply continue down this hall and then turn left and you’ll come to a staircase. At the end of the corridor at its top, you’ll see the door to her office.”

That didn’t sound too difficult. Ahiru nodded. “Thank you!” She turned and ran back out of the classroom. Behind her, she heard Mr. Katz ask Fakir to please close the door, and realized with some embarrassment that she’d left it open. She didn’t let herself dwell on it, though, choosing instead to focus on remembering the directions that she’d gotten.

Sure enough, the staircase was right where Mr. Katz had told her it was. She slowed her pace down as she stepped onto it, clutching at the bannister as she climbed slowly upwards. When she reached the top, the first thing she saw was the door at the end of the corridor. It was unmistakably large and made of dark wood, with a shiny golden knob. She walked down the hall even more slowly than she had ascended the stairs, and turned the knob with shaking fingers that she hoped wouldn’t smudge it too much. She noticed that there were still ink stains around her nails, and she cringed and hid her hands behind her back as she entered.

It was a large and sunny room, and the walls were mostly taken up by bookshelves full nearly to bursting with tomes of various sizes and thicknesses. Beneath one of the open windows was the comfiest-looking sofa Ahiru had ever seen, but Chrestomanci was seated at her desk, writing something on a piece of paper. She looked up as Ahiru came in, and smiled. “Ah, Ahiru. Do sit down.” She indicated the chair placed conveniently in front of her desk.

“You – you wanted to see me?” Ahiru sank gingerly into the richly upholstered chair. Amidst such elegant surroundings, she felt even shabbier in comparison, and almost wished she could sink into the floor and vanish.

“Yes.” Chrestomanci nodded. “It is time that I told you why I have brought you here. You see, Ahiru, you and I have something very important in common.”

“Me?” Ahiru gaped at her. “But – but what could I have in common with you? You’re – you’re so grand and important, and I’m – I’m nobody.” Her gaze dropped to the floor, and she twisted her hands in her lap. “Just… nobody at all.”

“Even the most precious diamonds must first be polished and shaped before they can truly shine for others.” Ahiru looked back up to see Chrestomanci still smiling at her. “And even the seemingly ordinary may hide something extraordinary within its depths. So it was with me when I was your age, and so too is it with you. Do you know why it is I hold the position of Chrestomanci?”

Ahiru shook her head. “N-no… I’d never heard of it until you came to visit me.” She blushed with fresh shame. “I – I’m sorry…”

“I am not grading you on your answers, Ahiru.” Chrestomanci shook her head too. “I do not mind explaining to you. The office of Chrestomanci can only be held by the most powerful enchanter, because it is our job to regulate magic in all the Related Worlds and make sure that it is not abused or used to subjugate others. You know what I mean by Related Worlds, right?”

“I – I think.” Ahiru bit her lip. “There’s a bunch of different worlds, and, um… well, there’s different kinds of them, right? There’re nine each to a… um…”

“A series,” Chrestomanci supplied. “Very good. Yes. There are twelve series, and in each series are nine different worlds. They were all one in the beginning, but split apart at key points in history that could have gone one of two ways. Worlds in the same series tend to share fundamental things, such as geography – for example, in Series Five, none of the worlds have continents, only islands. Do you understand so far?”

“Yes.” Ahiru nodded.

“Good. Now, worlds in the same series tend to share people as well. The same person may have one duplicate in each of the worlds in their series. It is also possible, though rarer, for people to be duplicated outside their series. However, there are only ever nine of a particular person. Except, that is, for people like you and I.” She took a sip from her cup of tea. “You and I, Ahiru, are the rarest type of enchanter – we are nine-lived enchanters. That means that our duplicates died at birth, or were simply never born. We therefore have nine lives, and are thus the most powerful type of enchanter, and the only people qualified to hold this office.”

“Wh-wh-what? No, that can’t be!” Ahiru shook her head wildly. “I – I’ve never used any magic! Ever! Even when I tried to during my lessons at my old school, I couldn’t.”

“I don’t know yet why that is, but it is why it took so long to find you.” Chrestomanci took another sip of tea. “Typically, we locate nine-lived enchanters when they use their magic, but you have so far been unable to call upon yours. It was sheer luck that Mr. Katz happened to be visiting relatives at the right time to have heard about a young orphan girl who fell out of a tree and died, only to come back to life a short while later. He relayed the tale to me at once, and when I came to see you, I could see at once that you are the one who will become the next Chrestomanci.”

“That’s how I survived?” Ahiru whispered, stunned. “I – I have nine lives? Well… eight now, I guess.”

“Seven, actually.” Chrestomanci frowned. “You do not remember how you lost your first one?”

“N-no… should I?” Despite what Chrestomanci had said about not grading her, Ahiru somehow felt like this was a test she was not passing.

“Hmmm. In any case, Ahiru, you will have to be trained in magic if you are to take over this position someday.” Chrestomanci changed the subject without batting an eye. “Starting tomorrow, you will begin studying basic witchcraft under Mr. Katz. After you have spent a year in his instruction, you will then begin to receive private lessons from me in more advanced magic. Fakir and Rue are learning higher levels of magic from Mr. Katz themselves, but as they are not required to take on as many responsibilities as you eventually will be, they do not need to be instructed in quite as many things as you do.”

“But… but…” Ahiru was beginning to feel desperate. She was sure there had been some sort of mistake, and the sooner it was discovered, the better. She didn’t want to have to leave the castle and go back to the orphanage, but it would be a little less painful if she did so now, before she was too attached to it and the people living there. “I really can’t do any magic…”

“And Mr. Katz will be attempting to discover the reason for that.” Chrestomanci smiled kindly at her. “Do not worry, Ahiru, soon enough you will be able to cast spells. It is likely that there is some sort of personalized weakness holding you back that you have yet to discover, that is preventing you from accessing your power. In my case, it was silver; who knows what it is for you?”

Ahiru thought that in her case her weakness was likely to be an utter lack of talent, but she didn’t argue the point and simply nodded. “I – I guess that’s probably…”

“Don’t worry,” Chrestomanci repeated, still smiling at her. “Now, if you have any more questions, please ask them; otherwise, you are free to go and enjoy your afternoon.”

“N-no, I think…” Ahiru shook her head. “I can’t think of anything to ask.”

“You may go, then.” She picked up her pen then, and went back to what she had been working on before Ahiru entered. “Feel free to explore the castle and the grounds, Ahiru; this is your home now, and you should make yourself accustomed to it.”

“Th-thank you, I – I think I will.” Ahiru rose from her seat and headed towards the study door. She paused at the doorway, and opened her mouth to say something, but decided against it and continued out into the hall.

The thought of exploring the castle grounds and getting herself used to the layout of the castle interior was tempting, but her mind was reeling from all that she had just learned, and so she instead went back to her room and flopped down on her bed. At some point, she managed to fall asleep, and did not wake up until the gong sounded for dinner.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note: If you’re not familiar with the Chrestomanci series, one of the details of the alternate Earth it takes place on is that America = Atlantis and is ruled by the Incas.


	5. Chapter 5

Ahiru woke up the next morning by falling out of bed, landing on the floor with the sheets tangled around her, her squawk of surprise muffled by the fabric. She lay still for a few minutes, just staring up at the ceiling, while the remnants of whatever dream she’d been having fled back into the dark corners of her mind every time she tried to peer at them. For a few fleeting moments, she thought she was going to hear wind howling outside the windows, but no – everything was still that same, unnatural quiet that blanketed the castle. She had the strangest feeling that it was magical in nature, but she couldn’t have said why.

She had just begun attempting to free herself from the sheets when Anne-Erina came in, and the maid immediately rushed to her side. “Oh, Miss Ahiru! What happened? Are you all right?”

“I – I think so,” Ahiru replied as she pulled one foot free. “I – I just fell out, it’s not a big deal, really. I’m fine!”

“If you say so.” Anne-Erina gave her a critical look. “I’ll go run your bath, then, if you don’t need any more help.”

Ahiru shook her head. “N-no, I’m fine, really. Thank you!”

“Of course.” Anne-Erina bustled off then, and soon enough Ahiru could hear the water running. She sat and listened to it for a minute or so, and then stood up so that she could go take out her clothes ahead of time, figuring that it might save her a bit of time once she was done bathing.

As soon as she put her weight down on her right foot, though, she knew she wasn’t completely fine. She’d banged her ankle somehow when she fell, and it hurt a little to walk on that foot. Not badly enough to ask Anne-Erina to call in a doctor – if the castle had one – but enough to make her limp slightly. She didn’t want Anne-Erina to see her and fuss, though, so she sat down on the bed to wait and pretended to be gathering up the sheets that had been dragged onto the floor.

“There now, all ready for you.” Anne-Erina reentered the room when she’d finished filling the tub. “I’ll be waiting outside, like yesterday. You call me if you need any help, all right?”

“I will! Thank you!” Ahiru nodded. She waited for the maid to leave the room before getting up and making her way carefully into the bathroom. She hoped the hot water would make her foot feel better, but no such luck – if the bath helped, it was only a little, and she was still walking funny when she got out and dressed and redid her hair. Anne-Erina was sure to notice it on the way to breakfast, Ahiru thought glumly.

And she did. “Oh, Miss Ahiru, you’re limping! Why did you tell me you were fine? We need to take you to the castle doctor right away!”

“N-no, no, we don’t, I’m okay! Really!” Ahiru waved her hands frantically. “I’m fine, I just bumped my foot too hard against the floor when I fell and it’s a little sore so I’m just trying to be really careful, it doesn’t hurt that much really, I’ll be okay, you don’t have to worry about me!”

“Well, if you insist, I can’t make you…” Anne-Erina gnawed on her lower lip. “But please, if it’s still bothering you later and hasn’t gotten any better, do have someone take you to the doctor, all right?”

“I – I will.” Ahiru nodded. “I promise.”

“Good.” She opened the door to the playroom then, and ushered Ahiru carefully in. Rue and Fakir were already there, both of them reading like they had been the day before. Rue looked up with a smile as she saw Ahiru enter, but her smile faded when she saw how the younger girl was walking.

“Ahiru, you’re limping! Are you all right? How did you hurt yourself?” She got up and hurried over to her, and thus missed the concern that displayed itself momentarily on Fakir’s face before he assumed a more neutral expression and turned to look at Ahiru. “Do you need help?”

“N-no, it’s fine.” Ahiru shook her head and kept walking, with Rue beside her, and sank down into her chair. “I just bumped my foot when I fell out of bed. It’s nothing.”

“You fell out of bed?” Rue’s frown deepened as she sat down next to Ahiru. “That’s not good, you could really hurt yourself that way.”

“It’s okay, really!” Ahiru shook her head again. “It’s not that far to fall, not like… not like out of the tree at the orphanage.” She shuddered. “That’s… that’s how I lost my first life, falling out of the tree. Wait, no, it was my second one, Chrestomanci said… but I don’t remember how I lost my first one. And she got this funny look on her face when I said that, and she said she wasn’t grading me on my answers but I still felt like I was failing something by not knowing that, and you’d think I’d know, wouldn’t you? Something big like that… it’s weird that I don’t know. Don’t you think so? It’s definitely weird.”

“Not really.” Ahiru jerked in surprise that Fakir was actually speaking to her, and gave him a startled look that he didn’t see because he had gone back to reading his book. “It’s not unusual for people to block out particularly traumatic memories, and the loss of a life would qualify for that. Your mind might be trying to protect you from something.”

“Maybe…” Ahiru dropped her gaze from Fakir’s face to stare at her empty plate. “I – I wish I knew, though. It doesn’t feel right not to know.”

“You’ll probably remember eventually, if it’s important enough to you.” Rue patted her hand where it rested on the table. “For now, just try and focus on the present. You mentioned last night that you get your first magic lesson today, right? You won’t be studying the same things we are, but it’ll still be exciting, I’m sure.”

“N-no, not really, cause…” Ahiru was interrupted by Anne-Erina setting down the breakfast tray. It was the exact same assortment of food as the day before: eggs, toast, and porridge. She waited until they’d all served themselves before continuing. “Cause… I already know I’ll be no good at it. I messed up at my old school.”

Rue frowned as she swallowed a mouthful of eggs. “That doesn’t mean you’ll do poorly here. You’re a nine-lived enchanter, having immense magical power goes with that. Having been born with all those lives adds to your power, I’m sure Chrestomanci explained that to you.”

“Sort of. But…” Ahiru stared mournfully down at her steaming tea and marmalade-laden toast. “I’m sure it doesn’t apply to me. I’m not magically gifted, I’m not special, I’m just an ordinary nobody. Magic isn’t meant for someone like me. It’s for people who have the skill and know-how.” Across the table, Fakir frowned for a moment before returning his attention to eating. “And I’m just not one of those people.”

“Ahiru, don’t talk like that.” Rue shook her head. “That’s not true.”

“Isn’t it?” She blinked a few times to chase away the tears she could feel forming. “I’ll fail again today, I know it.”

“Don’t be stupid.” She jerked in surprise again, not just because he was speaking to her, but also at the harsh tone of his voice. “You don’t know anything like that. What good does it do you to give up before you’ve even tried? Put in an honest effort first before you say things like that.”

“But, but I have tried!” Her cheeks were flushed and her lower lip trembled. “I told you yesterday – I flunked my class at my other school! I can’t do magic, I just can’t!”

“And Chrestomanci said that’s because you have a weakness that you’ve yet to discover, right?” He let out an irritated sigh. “Why can’t you just wait and see and try to find out what it is that’s holding you back? It doesn’t help you at all to declare yourself a lost cause without even attempting to figure out that much.”

“But I know I can’t, I was –”

“Ahiru,” Rue interrupted. “Listen, I think Fakir is being a bit too harsh about this, but he’s right, as loathe as I am to admit it. You shouldn’t give up on yourself so easily and not even try. Even Chrestomanci has a weak point that stops her casting magic when it’s used against her, you’re no different. And also, maybe you just had a bad teacher at your old school – did you ever think of that? Mr. Katz might be able to draw out your hidden gifts where your previous teacher failed.”

“But even the best teacher can’t do anything for a student who’s –”

“Ahiru.” Rue’s tone was gentle, but firm. “Stop. I know it’s hard for you after what happened in your last school, but you have to let go of that and give it your best shot here. You have the talent, you just need to give it time and work on figuring out what’s stopping you from accessing it. That might take a few classes, but it’s okay. It’ll happen eventually, so don’t give up.”

“Let me ask you something.” Ahiru hesitantly looked over at Fakir again. She couldn’t quite read the expression on his face, though at least he didn’t look annoyed. “When you came here, did you notice anything about the castle? Anything unusual?”

“W-well, I, I, um…” Ahiru screwed up her face in concentration, trying to remember. “I – I have noticed that it’s awfully quiet… and it kinda seems like it’s because of a spell or something, or at least it feels that way… it doesn’t really seem natural. It’s…” She paused, frowning. “I don’t know how to explain it.”

“It is magic. It’s a side effect of all the various spells and enchantments that have been put on the castle for its protection.” Fakir paused to finish off his tea. “The fact that you can sense that is the important part – people with no magical ability whatsoever just notice that it’s really quiet and peaceful. So if you want proof that you’re wrong about your perceived lack of magical talent, there it is.”

Ahiru gaped at him. “Really? Is – is that really true?”

Fakir’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not making it up to make you feel better, if that’s what you think.”

“It’s true, caring about the feelings of others is not his style,” Rue interjected. She ignored the fact that he predictably turned his glare on her and continued. “And so is what he said. He and I were both able to tell that about the castle when we came here. On the other hand, we’ve had some guests who were completely non-magical who barely noticed the extra quiet, if they did at all. There’s nothing at all wrong with lacking it, of course, but you are not one of those people.” She reached over and squeezed Ahiru’s hand. “So just relax and focus on the lessons.”

“Excellent advice, Miss Rue.” All three of them looked up with identical startled expressions to find that Mr. Katz was standing at the head of the table. None of them had heard the door open, or his footsteps across the room. “Now then, if you all are finished with your breakfast, please proceed into the classroom and we will begin said lessons.”

They all murmured some form of confirmation that they were, and followed him in, each taking the same desk as the day before. They started with history again, though to Ahiru’s relief they skipped being drilled on it before opening their books. They were assigned to write an essay on some queen whose name she couldn’t quite figure out how to pronounce (she had never been good at such things), and only when they had finished and handed them over to Mr. Katz for grading did they proceed onto math and geography, and then to a literature assignment. Ahiru was just getting into the story when Mr. Katz told them to set their books down because it was time for lunch, and that they would resume the reading on Thursday, as Wednesday was their free day.

Yesterday’s lunch had been a nice break from schoolwork, but today it meant that she only had a limited amount of time left before her first magic lesson with Mr. Katz. Her stomach was full of nervous knots, and so she barely touched her food, leaving most of the sandwiches for Rue and Fakir.

“It’ll be okay, Ahiru,” Rue said, squeezing her shoulder gently as they headed back into the schoolroom. “Even if you have a hard time, don’t worry – we understand. It’ll come eventually, you just have to figure out why it isn’t happening now, and don’t say it’s because you don’t have any talent. You do. And try not to force it, that’ll only make it worse.”

“O-okay.” Ahiru gulped. “I – I’ll try.”

They sat down at their desks again, and Mr. Katz instructed Rue and Fakir to pull out their Advanced Magical Theory textbooks and open to a specific page, which they did. Then he set a small hand mirror on Ahiru’s desk along with a battered copy of Magic for Beginners. Ahiru picked up the mirror and looked dubiously into it. “Am – am I trying a glamour spell or something?” Her voice quavered slightly. “To make me pretty?”

Mr. Katz’ mustache twitched. “That would be magic more advanced than beginner’s work, Miss Ahiru. No. This is a simple floatation exercise. Lay the mirror back down on your desk so that you can still look into it. While you’re looking into it, move it counterclockwise three times, twice silently willing, and then on the third time say aloud these words: rise, mirror, rise into the air, rise to the top of my head and then stay there.”

“Um, um, okay.” Ahiru swallowed, and obeyed Mr. Katz. She set the mirror down, keeping her eyes on her reflection as she turned the mirror counterclockwise. She willed it as hard as she could the first two times, and then on the third, spoke the words he’d told her to.

Nothing happened. Ahiru’s lower lip trembled. She could feel the tears already starting to fill her eyes. She didn’t dare look to either side of her, afraid of the reactions she’d see there, even though she knew full well that they were both concentrating on their own work.

Mr. Katz sighed. “Again, Miss Ahiru. And this time, try to keep your voice steady.”

She ended up losing count of how many different times they tried it, and how many different ways and places in the classroom they would attempt it. Nothing worked. One time, she thought she saw the mirror wiggle a bit, but Mr. Katz said with a heavy sigh that she should not settle for that, because that way led to complacence and mediocrity, and to keep trying. By the end of the lesson, she was convinced that that one time had been the product of wishful thinking brought on by desperation, because she never again saw it move. At last, Mr. Katz told her to sit down and read over the textbook he’d given her, and they’d try something else in the next lesson. So, her eyes brimming with tears of humiliation and frustration, Ahiru slumped back down in her seat again and began to read the book, though she didn’t really see or absorb anything on its worn, slightly yellowed pages.

When it was finally time to leave to enjoy some free time before dinner, she hurried out of the classroom ahead of the other two and rushed back to her room without speaking a word to them. She ran a bath, and stayed there until the water was cold and the gong had rung for dinner.


	6. Chapter 6

Wednesday morning dawned cloudy and cool, and for once, Ahiru slept peacefully until Anne-Erina came in and gently shook her awake. Dread instantly sprang to life inside her, but then she remembered that there were no lessons to be had that day and immediately relaxed.

So much so, in fact, that she took too long getting ready and was late for breakfast – when she walked in, the food was already on the table and Rue and Fakir had started in without her, though they’d left plenty for her.

“Morning, Ahiru,” Rue greeted her as she sat down. “Are you coming into the village with us today?”

“Huh? Village?” Ahiru stared blankly at her.

“You remember, don’t you?” Rue took a sip of her tea. “We’re allowed to walk down to Gold Crown on Wednesdays and Sundays, to spend our money and relax.” She indicated the envelope beside Ahiru’s breakfast plate. “That’s yours, to spend on whatever you like.”

“Oh! Yes… right…” Ahiru frowned as she slathered marmalade onto her toast. “Um… I don’t know… I was thinking of exploring the castle since I don’t really know it that well yet and I wanted to look around the gardens too, I just hope I don’t get lost…”

“Oh.” Rue looked disappointed. “That’s a shame; I was looking forward to spending some time together there. Oh well, there’s Sunday, and next Wednesday, and you do need to learn about the castle. Have you been to the library yet?”

Ahiru shook her head. “No. Where is it?”

“It’s all the way on the other end of this floor and around a corner, and it takes up two levels.” Rue smiled. “I think you’ll really like it. There are all sorts of books there, and not just from our world, either. There’s a lot from other worlds in our series, and from the worlds in other series too. I’ve read some really good ones from Series Five, but Fakir seems to prefer Series Seven books. You’ll have to read some from different ones and let me know what you think!”

“Ah… okay, that sounds good.” Ahiru waited until she’d eaten some of her breakfast before asking another question. “What’s the difference between Five and Seven? Chrestomanci said Five was all islands or something, I think, but I don’t know about Seven…”

“Five is the one where they have only islands, yes,” Rue confirmed. “I’d love to visit sometime and see the mermaids, for one thing. Seven is the one where it’s very mountainous all over, and there’s a Great Glacier which is supposed to be a famous tourist attraction. I’d like to visit that sometime, too.” She sighed wistfully. “There are so many I want to see, really.”

“That sounds fun.” Ahiru smiled. “Maybe Chrestomanci will take you someday on vacation.”

“That’d be nice. Actually, I think she was thinking of going to a Series Five world next summer and bringing us with her… and now that you’re here, you get to go too.” Rue dabbed at the corner of her mouth with her napkin. “I do hope it happens! It would be so lovely for all of us to get to go somewhere exciting like that, especially for you.”

Ahiru didn’t have the heart to tell her that she figured she’d be sent back to the orphanage well before then, so she forced a fresh smile onto her face and nodded. “Yeah… yeah, it would be…”

As they’d started eating before she’d even gotten there, Rue and Fakir finished their breakfasts first, and soon left Ahiru alone to finish hers as they headed off to spend their free day in the village. Left to her own devices, Ahiru poked around the room for a bit before going to explore the castle. The bookshelf had books that were mostly for younger readers, and they were somewhat dusty, but a couple looked like they might be interesting to look at some time. The cupboard was crammed full of a wide variety of toys – there was a train, some blocks, a set of soldiers, a few dolls, some stuffed animals, and a little house, among other things. They didn’t look like they’d been played with for a while and she couldn’t help but wonder if Uzura ever went in there to play or spend time with her adopted older siblings.

She wandered the halls of the floor she was on and a bit of the one below too for a while after that, forcing herself to concentrate on learning its layout. Only when she felt she had a good grasp on it did she proceed into the library at last. It really was as large as Rue had said, with two floors full of bookshelves and tables and chairs. And to her surprise, there were even more books there than initially met the eye: all she had to do to change the selection on a given shelf was touch the spell plate at the end, and the whole row slid to the right and vanished, even as a new set slid in from the left to replace them. She went around doing this to countless shelves before going to the fiction section and searching for something that interested her. After about an hour or so of browsing, she finally chose at least one book from each series, in some cases from more than one world in the series. She carried the wobbly stack back to her room, more than once dropping at least three or stubbing her toes on the walls, as she was having a hard time seeing over them all. It felt like it took a much longer time to get back to her bedroom than it had to get to the library.

At last, though, she made it back there and deposited the stack on her bed before turning around to see Uzura in the doorway. She jerked in surprise as she spotted her, not having expected company. “Qua – Uzura!”

“What are you doing zura?” Uzura trotted forward and peered up at Ahiru’s bed. “Are those books from the library zura?”

“Ah… yes.” Ahiru nodded, recovering from the shock. “Do you like books?”

“I like the ones with pictures zura. Do these have pictures zura?”

“I –” Ahiru started, but trailed off as a tall, slender woman in a pink dress, with curly brown hair that she’d braided and pinned up, appeared in the doorway. She seemed slightly out of breath, but relieved to see Uzura.

“Uzura, there you are!” Her gaze went next to Ahiru. “H-hello, I’m Miss Goatette, Uzura’s nanny. Was she bothering you?”

“No, not at all!” Ahiru shook her head. “I – I’m Ahiru, it’s nice to meet you!”

“Yes, the same to you.” Miss Goatette looked down at Uzura. “Uzura, you mustn’t run away, do you understand? And you can’t just barge into Miss Ahiru’s room without permission. Now, come along and –”

“I want to play with Ahiru!” Uzura’s expression became positively mutinous. “I haven’t gotten to play with her yet zura!”

“Uzura, dear, I’m sure Miss Ahiru is very busy, and she can’t just –”

“Actually, it’s my free day,” Ahiru interrupted. “I was going to go for a walk outside, so if it’s okay, Uzura can come with me. Is it okay?”

“Only if she promises to stay with you and not run off.” Miss Goatette gave Uzura a stern look. “Do you promise to stay with Miss Ahiru and not run away from her? I don’t want you giving her any trouble.”

“I understand zura.” Uzura nodded. “I promise to stay with Ahiru zura.”

“All right, then, you can go with her.” Miss Goatette sighed. “Thank you, Miss Ahiru, and I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s okay, I don’t mind, really!” Ahiru smiled and extended her hand. “Come on, Uzura, want to go exploring with me? You can show me all around the gardens.”

“Okay zura!”

Uzura took her hand, and held it all the way downstairs and out the door that Ahiru had come in through on her first day. They walked over the gravelly driveway towards the gardens. Just ahead, past the smooth lawn, Ahiru could see the flower gardens she always gazed at from her bedroom window, and beside it, the extensive vegetable garden. “Wow…” she marveled to herself as they drew closer.

“Ooohhh.” Uzura tugged on her hand. “Look zura. The kitty is asleep zura.”

“Kitty?” Ahiru looked where Uzura was pointing. She expected to see a cat curled up under a tree, but instead spotted Mr. Katz. He was stretched out in a lawn chair that was positioned so that what little sun was coming through the grey clouds was shining directly on him. He was indeed snoozing, with a wedding magazine lying across his chest. “Oh… Mr. Katz…”

“He’s a cat zura.” Uzura nodded.

“What?” Ahiru blinked. “N-no, he’s not, he’s human.”

“But that’s his name zura.” Uzura looked rather insistent. “Mr. Cat.”

Ahiru shook her head. “No, his name is Mr. Katz.” She stressed the z on the end. “It sounds kind of the same, but it’s not.”

“But he has whiskers zura. And…” Uzura pondered it for a moment and then brightened. “I’ll find his tail zura!”

“No!” Ahiru just barely managed to catch Uzura as she started to run off towards Mr. Katz. “I – I don’t think – I don’t think – I think – that’s not a good idea! We – we shouldn’t bother him while he’s sleeping, he – he might get mad and, and scratch you!”

“With his claws zura?” Uzura stopped struggling. “Are they sharp zura?”

“Really, really sharp!” Ahiru nodded. “And, and you promised Miss Goatette you wouldn’t run off, so, so you should stay with me and go where I’m going, okay?”

“All right zura. I understand zura.” Uzura nodded. “Let’s go zura.”

They wandered into the flower gardens next, and Ahiru was even more amazed at it up close. There were rose bushes and honeysuckle vines, irises and daffodils, lily of the valley, orchids, and countless others she didn’t recognize, in a wonderland of color and scent. Uzura picked a rose at one point, and a previously unseen gardener appeared to sternly tell them that they were not allowed to pick the flowers. Uzura loudly insisted that it was for Ahiru and her mama wouldn’t be mad, and after a short argument, the disgruntled gardener conceded and disappeared behind a rhododendron tree. Uzura then proudly presented the rose to her, and Ahiru, feeling a little dazed, took it and thanked her.

At the end of the flower garden was a long hedge, split by an arched trellis supporting a clematis vine. Emerging through it, she could see a tall, ruined wall just at the top of a small rise. Ahiru took Uzura’s hand again to lead her up the little hill, but when they got there the wall was gone, and before them loomed the castle orchards. She frowned, but said nothing, and continued down the slope towards the orchards. Rows and rows of apple and pear trees towered over them, the fruit looking tantalizingly ripe, but just out of Ahiru’s reach. Not that she would have picked one anyway, when she knew another unseen gardener was likely to pop up and scold her for picking the fruit. And unlike Uzura, she didn’t really belong here, so she couldn’t get away with it the way the little girl had. It was for the best that she couldn’t reach it, really.

She spotted the wall again when they drew near to the outer edge of the orchard, a little way outside it at the bottom of another small slope. Ahiru carefully made her way down with Uzura’s hand grasped tightly in hers, but when she got to the bottom, they were at a wide pond filled with goldfish, and she could see what looked like ducks swimming in the distance. Ahiru’s shoulders slumped and she heaved a great sigh.

“What’s wrong zura?” Uzura asked, peering up at her.

“Um, well, this might sound kinda weird but… but I keep seeing this wall, and whenever we get close to it, it disappears and we’re somewhere else.” Ahiru scratched her head with her free hand. “Maybe I’m imagining things…”

“Ooooohhh. That’s Mama’s special garden zura. No one’s allowed in there zura.” Uzura let go of Ahiru’s hand and took a few steps towards the pond. “Did you bring food to feed the ducks with zura?”

“N-no, I…” As if in response to the question about food, Ahiru’s stomach growled, and she realized that it must surely be lunch time, or close enough. Maybe even past lunch, she thought, with some alarm. They were most certainly going to be missing Uzura back at the castle, if that was the case. “Um, Uzura, I – I think we should head back now, it must be time for lunch. Are you hungry?”

“A little bit zura.” Uzura walked back to Ahiru and held out her tiny hand. “Let’s go eat then zura.”

“Okay!” Ahiru took her hand, and together they walked all the way back to the castle. They found Miss Goatette waiting for them, and Uzura insisted on eating lunch with Ahiru. Ahiru didn’t mind, especially when they got to the playroom and found that neither Rue nor Fakir was back from the village yet. They had a nice lunch together, and played with some of the toys in the cupboard before it was time for Uzura’s nap. Ahiru helped Miss Goatette lay her down for her nap, and then went back to her own room, where she looked through her selection of library books and tried to pick which one to read first. She didn’t end up making a choice until a little while before the gong rang for dinner, and was thus sad to have to put it down and get ready. It was a book from World 12B, about a star that was a person but then also had to be a dog after being wrongly accused of doing something terrible. She reluctantly marked her place with a bookmark, and then dressed for dinner and hurried downstairs. At least it would still be there when she got back, she consoled herself. And it was; after a nice dinner spent hearing about Rue’s day in the village, Ahiru hurried back to her room and read until she fell asleep with the light on and the book in her hands.


	7. Chapter 7

The rest of the week passed much as Tuesday had. Every day, Ahiru did well in her morning lessons, but was met with failure in the afternoon as she continued to attempt to learn magic. She grew progressively more disheartened with each session, though she tried to hide it as best she could. The only things that kept her spirits up to any degree were the books she’d taken from the castle library, and more walks around the grounds with Uzura. Despite Uzura’s words about no one being allowed in, Ahiru couldn’t resist trying to get close to the mysterious ruined wall whenever it appeared in her line of sight. Every time she seemed to draw near, however, it shifted away from her somehow. It was beginning to be a game the two of them played, to see how close they could come to it and how many times they would spot it before they had to go in and get ready for dinner.

Nevertheless, Sunday was a welcome respite, and she took her time bathing and dressing, as there was no need to hurry. Just as she was nearly finished, she was surprised by a knock on the door.

“Ahiru?” It was Rue. “Can I come in?”

“What? O-oh, of course!” Ahiru hastily smoothed down her dress as Rue opened the door. “Is – is something wrong?”

“Not at all.” Rue smiled. “I just wanted to tell you that I’m taking you clothes shopping in the village today – we’ll head out after breakfast. Mr. Katz is going to drive us down, so that we don’t have to walk back with all our bags afterwards.”

“What?” Ahiru’s face fell. “But – but I don’t have enough money yet to buy any clothes, I’ve only got this week’s pocket money…”

“You don’t need that.” Rue waved a hand dismissively. “Chrestomanci is paying for it all; she gave me the money earlier. She was supposed to come with us, actually, but then she had to rush off because there was a new lead to the location of the head of some smuggling ring she’s been working to break up. So it’s just us. I hope that’s all right with you.”

“It’s – it’s fine, I just…” Ahiru twisted the hem of her dress in her hands. “I feel bad that she’s spending money on getting me new clothes, I mean, I’m just…”

“She adopted you, Ahiru,” Rue reminded her gently. “That means she’s responsible for your care, and clothing you is part of that. Now come on, we should go eat breakfast before we leave.”

“R-right!” Ahiru hurried after her to the playroom, where they ate breakfast in a bit of rush, so quickly that Fakir hadn’t yet finished when they got up and headed downstairs. Mr. Katz was waiting for them just outside the back door that led to the gardens, with the car ready to go. Ahiru bounced a little in her seat as he started it up, excited despite her guilty feelings about the money that would shortly be spent on her. She had never gotten to go shopping like this before, after all, and certainly not with another girl close to her own age. She didn’t feel right at all about spending Chrestomanci’s money, but she couldn’t help but feel anyway that this was going to be fun.

When they got there, Rue led her to a shop that she said was her very favorite, because it always had nice things in and kept up with the latest trends from the cities. The prices Ahiru saw on the tags made her feel faintly ill, but Rue insisted that she not look at that and focus on finding cute things she liked, because Chrestomanci could definitely afford it and she shouldn’t worry. She tried not to, and urged herself to forget about the issue of money, but every so often in the fitting room would see how much a particular dress or skirt cost and it would make her insides squirm with anxiety all over again. She couldn’t help but feel she was not worth all this expense, and it made her unhappy even though she was otherwise enjoying herself. Rue gave her input on every outfit, so that she could choose the things that were prettiest and most flattering on her (she felt a bit like there was no such thing, but Rue was so encouraging and kind that it helped her feel slightly more confident, at least for a while). By the time they were ready to pay, Ahiru had selected several new outfits, some undergarments, some coats and sweaters for the coming autumn and winter months, and new shoes. She didn’t like to think about how much it would all cost.

“We should get you some accessories sometime too, to go with the clothes,” Rue said as they walked towards the cash registers. “Some new jewelry would be nice, so you don’t always have to wear that.” She indicated the pendant around Ahiru’s neck, an oval shaped red jewel on a simple iron chain.

“I – I want to wear it, though.” Ahiru’s hand went to the jewel. “It belonged to my mother… it’s one of the only things I have left of her…”

“Oh.” Rue winced. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”

Ahiru shook her head. “It’s okay. You didn’t know.”

“But I should’ve known it was something of sentimental value.” Rue sighed. “I say thoughtless things sometimes, Ahiru, please don’t pay too much attention to me.” She ran a hand through her hair and sighed again. “Well, then, maybe a bracelet or two? It might be hard to find something that stays on, though – you have such small wrists and hands that a lot of bracelets would probably slip right off. Maybe earrings? Though you’d have to pierce your ears.”

This time Ahiru’s hands went protectively to her earlobes. “I… I don’t think I could do that… it sounds too painful…”

“It’s not that bad. It’s over pretty quickly. But you’d have to take good care of them so they don’t get infected. That part is kind of a hassle.” Rue looked over to see that Ahiru had wandered a short ways away, to a stand full of umbrellas for sale. “Oh! Yes, you should have one of those too, I can’t believe I forgot.” She moved to stand at Ahiru’s side as she browsed the selection. “Find any good ones?”

“Um… well…” Ahiru hesitated. “Do you… promise you won’t laugh? Please?”

Rue frowned. “Why would I laugh?”

“W-well, um, at the orphanage some of the kids made fun of stuff I had and I have this pillow and sometimes they’d hide it from me or they’d take it and toss it to each other and it got a little beat up because of that and it made me really sad but I managed to hold onto it and I still have it, but… some stuff I used to have I lost because of them and I feel bad about it and um… I guess I kinda feel like, like… I don’t know.” Ahiru bit her lip. “It’s hard to explain.”

“I think I understand.” Rue squeezed her shoulder. “But you don’t have to hide what you like from me, because I won’t laugh. Ever. I promise.” She smiled. “So show me which one you like.”

“O-okay.” Ahiru lifted up one of the umbrellas from the stand. It was a soft shade of blue, and there was a picture of a little yellow duckling on it. “I – I like this one.”

“Oh, that’s cute!” Rue leaned forward to get a closer look at it. “I like it – it suits you, Ahiru.”

“You – you really think so?” Ahiru blushed.

“Of course.” Rue took the umbrella from her and hooked it on her arm. “If this is the one you want, let’s go pay for all this, and then we’ll go have lunch.”

“Y-yeah, it is…”

Ahiru kept her distance while Rue took everything to the counter and paid for it with Chrestomanci’s money, as she really didn’t want to hear what it was all going to cost. When everything had been folded and bagged and the correct change handed back to Rue, the two girls exited the shop and headed for where Mr. Katz was sitting in the car, idly pawing through another one of his wedding magazines. They loaded the bags into the car and then had him drive to a nearby café, where the three of them had a nice lunch bought with the rest of the money Chrestomanci had given Rue. It was the first time Ahiru had eaten in a restaurant, and the excitement overrode the fresh guilt that flared up in her, enough to let her even order dessert. Mr. Katz drove them back to the castle after they were done, and the girls headed straight up to Ahiru’s room to unpack the purchases.

“Have you decided what you’ll wear to dinner tonight?” Rue asked her as she hung a particularly pretty little green dress in Ahiru’s wardrobe. “I think this one here is really nice, but then, so is the yellow one, and that pink one too… oh, but really, I like everything you chose.”

“Me too, it’s hard to decide what to wear first!” Ahiru confessed as she folded undergarments and slipped them into the drawers. “There’s just so many pretty ones…”

“And you look lovely in all of them. No, don’t say it,” Rue added as Ahiru blushed and opened her mouth to protest. “You’re very pretty, Ahiru, don’t let anyone convince you otherwise. I’m not sure who made you think you’re not, but I assure you, you don’t need a glamour spell or anything like that. Yes, I was listening when you said that in class.”

“But I’m not.” Ahiru’s gaze dropped to the floor. “I’m really not. Especially compared to you. I’ll never be as pretty as you are.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Rue closed the wardrobe door. “You shouldn’t compare yourself to me, or any other girl, for that matter. We all have to look like ourselves. You’re not going to look just like me, but then, it goes the other way too, I’m not going to look just like you, either.”

“That’s good,” Ahiru mumbled. “You wouldn’t want to.”

“Nonsense.” Rue sighed. “Anyone would be lucky to look like you. You have a very sweet face, and pretty eyes, and I’ve never seen hair that color before. It’s very striking.”

“Really?” Ahiru tilted her head, a slight frown on her face. “I – I get it from my mother.” She picked up the picture on her bedside table and thrust it at Rue. “This is a picture of her… it’s the only one I have.”

“Oh my.” Rue’s eyebrows went up as she saw the photograph. “You’re right – she does have the same color hair that you do. You resemble her a lot, actually.” She studied the smiling woman in the picture a bit – she really did look like an older version of Ahiru, just with shorter hair. She even had the same cowlick. “Huh. She looks a little familiar besides your resemblance to her, come to that.”

“W-well, she was a famous ballerina before she had me,” Ahiru said. “They nicknamed her Princess Tutu because she was so talented.” She unclasped her pendant and held it up against the photo. “See? She’s wearing it there, only the chain is different cause the old one broke.”

“I think I might have heard of her, the name sounds familiar.” Rue handed the photo back to her. “She was quite a beauty, and you take after her, so I don’t know why you think you’re not going to grow up to be just as beautiful. Like I said, you’re already very pretty.”

“W-well, I –”

She was interrupted by Miss Goatette appearing in the doorway, looking rather frantic. Some of her normally neat hair had come loose of its pins, and her face was flushed. “Oh, Miss Ahiru! And Miss Rue!” She took a moment to try and catch her breath. “Have – have either of you seen Uzura? She was supposed to be having her nap, but when I went into her room to check on her, she was gone, and I can’t find her.” Panic bubbled up in her voice. “If I can’t find her, I’ll…”

“Relax,” Rue said in a commanding tone. “Try and think of where she’d be most likely to have gone.”

“That’s the trouble, she could be anywhere. You know her.” Miss Goatette looked desperate. “I tried the playroom, but it’s empty, and she’s not in the library, or the kitchens, and Chrestomanci could return any second, and I…”

“I’ll help look for her,” Ahiru interrupted. She set the pendant and photo down on her bedside table. “We could probably find her faster if we split up and searched different places, she has to be around here somewhere.”

“You’ll help me, Miss Ahiru?” Miss Goatette’s eyes widened with hope and relief. “Oh – I can’t thank you enough! You shouldn’t have to help me, but please, please do! I don’t want to be sacked for losing Chrestomanci’s daughter…”

“You won’t be.” Rue rolled her eyes. “Everyone knows Uzura is prone to doing things like this, I’m sure she got some idea in her head when she was supposed to be sleeping and took off to go do it because to her mind it needed to be done right away. We’ll find her soon enough – yes, I’ll help you too – and bring her back, and Chrestomanci will be none the wiser. All right?”

“A-all right.” Miss Goatette nodded. “Thank you so much, Miss Rue! And Miss Ahiru!”

“Think nothing of it,” Rue replied.

They split up to search the house and the grounds then – Miss Goatette went up to the next floor, while Rue started with the ground floor, and Ahiru went outside. She had a feeling, based partly on things Uzura had said on their afternoon walks, where the little girl might have disappeared to. She dashed headlong through the flower gardens and then straight on towards the orchards, ignoring the ruined wall as it loomed up ahead of her like a mirage and then slid away sideways once she got too close to it. She slowed down a little about halfway through the orchard, letting herself catch her breath and walk at a more relaxed pace. She wasn’t entirely sure she was right, but she had a feeling about it that went beyond just remembering what Uzura had said to her.

She stopped in her tracks as she reached the edge of the orchard. Just as she’d thought, Uzura was at the duck pond, but she wasn’t alone: Fakir was there too, kneeling on the ground beside her. He said something to her that Ahiru couldn’t hear, and Uzura answered him enthusiastically, clapping her hands together in her eagerness. And then Fakir did something entirely unexpected: he smiled. Ahiru’s breath caught in her throat at the sight, and she watched, stunned, as he reached up and ruffled Uzura’s hair, drawing a giggle from her that was followed by a laugh of his own. Her mouth fell open slightly at the double dose of shock – she couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing. She was so used to Fakir looking severe that it was bewildering to see him smiling gently at Uzura, his normally expressionless eyes soft and warm as he gazed at her. As Ahiru continued to stare, he took one of Uzura’s tiny hands in his larger ones and put something in her palm. She said something to him that produced another laugh, and then ran over to where a duck had just waddled up out of the water. She scattered whatever Fakir had given her on the ground, and then backed away carefully while the duck pecked at it. Uzura watched the duck eat for a minute, then turned around and hurried back towards Fakir.

On her way, though, she spotted Ahiru, and her face lit up with delight as their eyes met. “Ahiruuuuuuuuuu!” she called, waving one of her little hands at her. “Come feed the ducks zura!” Fakir looked surprised for a moment as he too glanced up at Ahiru, who was hurrying towards Uzura now.

“Hello, Uzura,” Ahiru said brightly as they reached each other. “Is this where you went? Miss Goatette was looking for you, she was pretty worried. You’re not supposed to run off in the middle of your nap, you know.”

“There was no need to worry – I’ve been with her the whole time.” Ahiru looked up to see that Fakir had followed Uzura. Like a cloud passing over the sun, his smile had been replaced by a more serious expression. “She found me in the library and wanted to come feed the ducks.”

“And you brought her here like she asked?” Ahiru couldn’t help but smile up at him – despite that he was back to being the usual Fakir, what she had just seen somehow made him a little less intimidating now. “What a good big brother she has.”

“I – I just –” To her intense curiosity, he seemed a little flustered. “It’s easier to give in to her demands, is all – when she decides she wants something, her heart is set on it and she won’t stop pestering you until you let her have whatever it is. That’s all.”

“Yeah, I think Rue said something like that before I came out here.” Ahiru’s smile didn’t budge. He wasn’t fooling her – the look on his face when he thought he wasn’t being watched was not that of someone who was only grudgingly giving in to his little sister’s requests because he’d get no peace if he didn’t. “Does she like coming out here a lot? She asked me the other day if I’d brought food to feed the ducks with, and she keeps bringing it up, so I had a feeling she’d be out here.”

“Yeah, she loves it here.” Fakir raised an eyebrow and studied Ahiru for a moment. “What do you mean by a feeling that she was here? Was it just a guess because of what she’d said, or did you sense it?”

“Huh?” Ahiru frowned. “Well, I did remember what she’d said, but I also… I also kind of…” Her eyes widened as she stared up at him. “Um, actually, now that I think about it… I think I did kind of have a real feeling that she was out here… I kind of just knew it somehow. Is – is that…”

“Yeah.” He nodded. “That’s enchanter level magic. It doesn’t always work, even for me, but when you get a strong feeling like that, it tends to be right. You should listen to it when that happens.”

“You’re an enchanter too?” Ahiru couldn’t remember either Fakir or Rue mentioning before what level of magic they were both capable of.

“Yes. Rue, too. Neither of us is nine-lived like you, though – we’re just regular enchanters. If you can use such a term, that is.”

“So there’s other versions of you out there in other worlds?” Ahiru thought about what it was that Chrestomanci had told her. “Have you ever met any of your duplicates? What are they like?”

“I have no idea. I’ve never even been to any of the other worlds.” He shrugged. “I –”

“Fakir!” Uzura was tugging on his pants.

“What is it?”

“Do you like Ahiru?”

“Wh-what?” He stared down at her with slightly widened eyes. “Why are you asking me –”

“I like Ahiru because she’s really nice zura. You should like her too zura. Then you can be her friend like I am zura.”

“I –”

“Awwww, I like you too, Uzura!” Ahiru bent down to Uzura’s level, smiling at her. “I’m glad I’m your friend.” She extended her hand to her. “Come on, why don’t we go back to the castle and let everyone know you’re all right? And maybe we can get a snack in the kitchens, too!”

“Okay zura!”

Uzura took her hand, and the two of them walked off in the direction of the castle. Fakir watched them for a moment before following.


	8. Chapter 8

Ahiru was late for breakfast again on Wednesday. Half-asleep and believing it to be another school day, she actively resisted getting up until Anne-Erina reminded her that it was her free day. The relief that set in upon hearing that was enough to motivate her to leave the comfort of her bed and get into her warm bath, which she lingered in. By the time she got to the playroom, Rue and Fakir were nearly finished with their own breakfasts. The toast had gone cold, but the tea, through some magic laid upon the teapot, was still hot. She assured Rue that she would meet her in the village once she was done and that it was okay to go on without her, and happily ate her breakfast while the other two departed. It was a little strange and lonely to eat by herself, after having grown so accustomed, first at the orphanage, and then here with the two of them, to eating with others present, but she knew she only had herself to blame for being tardy.

Outside the playroom, she found Uzura waiting for her, with a harried-looking Miss Goatette close behind her. “Are you going to the village too zura?”

Ahiru nodded. “Yes. I really want to look around it this time!”

“But – but I wanted to go for another walk zura.” Uzura looked disappointed.

“I’m sorry!” Ahiru bent down to Uzura’s level. “We’ll take a walk when we get back, okay?”

“You promise zura?”

“I promise.” Ahiru ruffled her hair. “And we’ll feed the ducks too!”

Uzura brightened at that. “Hooray zura!” She took off down the hall, banging on the brightly painted little drum strapped to her waist. “Ducky wucky, ducky wucky…”

“Uzura…” Miss Goatette sighed and followed. Ahiru watched them, smiling, and then headed on her way. She had two weeks’ worth of pocket money to spend, and she couldn’t wait to see what she could buy with it. It was true that she hadn’t gotten to really look around during her Sunday shopping trip with Rue, and she was eager to go exploring.

It was only a short walk from the Castle gates to the village. It was a pretty little town, as she’d noticed on Sunday, with a lot of interesting looking shops. She could see the dress shop Rue had taken her to in the distance – recognizable by the blue and white striped awnings over its windows – and all sorts of other places. She passed by a bakery, a bookshop, and a post office as she strolled through, turning her head all around to take in everything. It was a pleasant day, and perfect for being outdoors: the sun was warm on her back, but not too much, and the air was crisp and cool in that delightful early autumn way. She didn’t see Fakir or Rue anywhere, but she wasn’t worried about finding them right away, she wanted to wander on her own a bit first and look around at a leisurely pace.

The next place that caught her eye was a shop that stood out from all the rest by virtue of being shabbier and less inviting than the rest of the prettily-painted storefronts and houses. Through the dingy front window that looked like it hadn’t been properly cleaned in some time, she could see shelves and tables crowded with all sorts of strange objects and jars, and some old books. The peeling paint on the old sign that hung above the door told her that it was a witchcraft supply store that had been in business for several decades. It certainly appeared that way. Ahiru shuddered and moved on, not liking the look of either the building or the weird, squishy things in some of the jars displayed in the window.

Around the next corner she found something that easily took her mind off the creepy little store: a large sweet shop, its bricks painted a charming shade of yellow, with a cascade of candy on display in the crystal clear windows. This was the place where she would begin spending her money, there could be no doubt about it. There were two girls pressed up against the glass of the bigger window, staring longingly inside; Ahiru felt sorry for them, as they clearly lacked money of their own to spend on the tantalizing treats inside. She knew what that was like, all too well. She spared them a sad glance as she entered the shop, the bell above the door jangling as she did so.

Oh, but what to buy? It was a question of monumental importance. It was obvious that even two weeks’ worth of money would not be enough to purchase a bit of everything, and she wanted to have some money left over in case she spotted any other interesting stores today, not to mention to save and add to the next week’s share. So she would have to narrow down her choices to a few… but how? There were so many different varieties of candy here, many of them wholly unfamiliar to her. She’d sampled some candy in her life prior to now, but not a whole lot, and to be able to choose whatever she liked out of a treasure trove of options was a bit overwhelming.

She was so absorbed in browsing that she didn’t even notice Fakir walk right by her on his way out, and she ended up spending the better part of an hour hemming and hawing about what to get. In the end, she went with some of her favorite vanilla walnut fudge, a bag of raspberry lime rock candy, and a large quantity of gummi bears, and walked out the door still feeling vaguely uncertain and hoping she’d made the right choices. The girls had long since abandoned the shop window and were now hanging around outside some kind of general supply store just down the street. Across the street from it, she could see Rue through the window of a makeup and accessory shop, and decided to join her there.

“Ahiru!” Rue’s face lit up as she spotted her approaching. “You made it! Good!” She glanced down at the bag Ahiru was carrying and her mouth curved into a knowing smirk. “Ah, you’ve discovered the sweet shop, I see. Fakir’s in there every Wednesday without fail, but I’m not much for sweets myself unless it’s very very dark chocolate. What did you think of it?”

“It was amazing!” Ahiru’s eyes sparkled. “I’ve – I’ve never been in a candy store like that one, I didn’t even recognize most of the things they had. I want to try them all eventually!” She looked at the handful of ribbons in Rue’s hands. “What are you buying?”

“Oh, I haven’t picked anything yet, but I was thinking of getting some new hair ribbons, a few of my old ones are getting a little frayed around the ends.” She cast a considering look at Ahiru. “Actually, I think it might be a good idea if you got some too – you could braid these in, like I do sometimes, and put your hair up. I could even help you if you like, you know. It would look really pretty on you!”

Ahiru blushed slightly. “You – you think so? Really?”

“Of course!” Rue began to sort through the pile of ribbons, setting aside the ones she thought would go well with Ahiru’s hair. “You have such lovely hair, and you can do a lot with it because it’s so long. I think if you start thinking about things like that, and letting yourself have fun, you’ll start feeling more confident in how you look. I think it’d be really good for you to start experimenting a bit and finding out what you like.”

“W-well… I do like these,” Ahiru admitted as she looked over the selection Rue had made for her. “It might be fun to try something different sometime…”

“See?” Rue smiled. “Just start with one thing, like your hair, and let the fun you have make you feel better about yourself. And you can always ask me for help with anything, of course.”

“Th-thanks. I – I’ve never… had anyone to ask about any of this before,” Ahiru admitted. “The only girls my age or older at the orphanage tended to be mean or just didn’t talk to me at all, so…”

“I believe it.” Rue sighed. “Some people are just jerks, unfortunately. And in that kind of environment, well, I wouldn’t be surprised if they were taking out their own misery on others. It doesn’t make it right, but it makes sense.” She looked distant for a moment as if remembering something, then shook herself out of it. “Come on, let’s pick a few for you to start with. I think this blue one especially would be really nice, and this green one too, and…” She trailed off as something caught her eye, and giggled. “Oh. Oh my.”

“What? What is it?” Ahiru looked at where Rue was pointing. “Um, do you mean those girls?” It was the same pair she’d seen outside the candy store and then at the supply store across the street. They were still there. One of them had light violet hair pinned up in a bun, while the other had blonde hair tied in two pigtails. “Who are they? I saw them outside the candy store earlier.”

“They,” Rue informed her with a note of amusement in her voice, “are Fakir’s fan club, so you should expect to see them every Wednesday, and their presence will reliably inform you of which store he’s presently shopping at. If you saw them there, then he must’ve been inside at the time.”

“He has a… fan club?” The blonde one whispered something to the purple-haired girl, and they both giggled behind their hands. They looked to be around Ahiru’s age.

“Yes. For whatever reason, they’re completely smitten with him and have taken to following him around town every time he’s here, and watching from the outside just like they are now. I don’t really get the appeal, but then again, there’s no accounting for taste.”

Ahiru opened her mouth to point out that for all his apparent – how much of it was genuine and how much was affected to hide his real feelings was something she was no longer certain of anymore – grumpiness, Fakir was actually really handsome, especially when he smiled, and so she did understand it. But before the words could come out, she thought better of it and closed her mouth again, feeling her face grow a little hot. Why was she thinking something like that, anyway? Silly! “Oh,” was all she said in the end, trying to sound as casual as possible.

“If nothing else, it’s a good way of finding him if for some reason you need to.” Rue didn’t seem to have noticed that anything was amiss with Ahiru. “I mean, generally we walk back on our own, we don’t have to go together, but there have been a couple situations where we needed to locate each other in a hurry, and I’ve used those two as a reliable indicator in those cases. Anyway, did you find some that you like?”

“Huh? Oh… right…” Ahiru looked back at the ribbons. “Um… I think I’ll get the blue one, and the yellow, and the green.”

“Get a white one too, that’ll go with all the stuff you got on Sunday.” Rue added a lacy white ribbon to the three Ahiru had chosen. “They’re not expensive, so don’t worry about that.”

“Okay.”

They browsed for a little while longer. Ahiru bought only the ribbons she’d selected, while Rue bought some for herself, as well as some new pins for her hair, an eye shadow set with colors she wanted to try, and a bottle of sparkly red nail polish. When they left with their purchases, the two girls were no longer in front of the store across the street, so Fakir had clearly finished his business there and moved on.

Ahiru saw them again as she and Rue rounded a corner – they were scurrying across the road in a hurry. She turned her head to watch them duck into a shop door, and ended up plowing into someone who was coming out of the store just ahead of her. She stumbled backwards, and somehow managed to avoid falling. “S-sorry! I’m really sorry!”

“Hey, watch where you’re – oh, it’s you.” It was Fakir. “Hmph. Idiot. Be more careful, you could get hurt like that.”

“Oh dear, I should have warned you.” Rue laughed as she came up behind Ahiru. “When you see them running away like that, it means he’s on his way out and they don’t want to get caught.”

“They?” Fakir frowned. “What are you on about now?”

“Those two.” Rue gestured at where the girls were peeking out of the front window of the store they’d hidden in. “Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed them following you around before? They’re completely obsessed with you. Search me as to why, but they always turn up to spy on you whenever we’re here.”

“How annoying.” Fakir scowled.

“Really? That’s your reaction?” Rue raised an eyebrow. “Why, I should think you’d be flattered! I mean, how many people can claim they have their very own fan club? You should think about approaching them sometime, I bet they’d love it. They might even ask for your autograph!”

“Why would I want to do that? You’re ridiculous.” Fakir’s scowl deepened, if that was possible. “Do you honestly think I should talk to people who run across the street because they don’t want to be caught spying on someone? I don’t understand their behavior any more than you do, and I’m not going to encourage it, either.”

“Goodness, you’re in a cross mood today.” Rue rolled her eyes. “I was just teasing you, Fakir. Do us both a favor and grow a sense of humor, please.” She turned to Ahiru. “I think I’m going to head back to the castle now; are you coming, or do you want to look around a little more, since you got here later?”

“I – I think I’ll stay here, if – if that’s all right,” Ahiru said.

Rue shook her head. “You don’t need my permission.” She smiled over her shoulder as she walked off. “Have a good time!”

When Rue had disappeared down the street, Ahiru turned back to Fakir. “Um, I’m really sorry about bumping into you. I didn’t harm any of the stuff you bought, did I?”

He shook his head. “Forget it. You already apologized, there’s no need to say it again.”

“I – I know, I just…” Ahiru trailed off as she looked at the stuff he was carrying. He had a package of paper, a bag from the shop he’d just left, and two bags of candy. “How come you have two bags of candy?”

“… One’s for Uzura.” He shrugged, trying to look nonchalant.

“Really?” Ahiru’s distressed look transformed into a smile. “That’s so sweet of you! She’ll be really happy!”

“It’s no big deal.” Was it her imagination, or had he gone a little pink? “I usually buy her something because she fusses if I don’t.”

Ahiru had a feeling that if that was true, it was because Uzura had gotten used to him buying her things on his own. She didn’t say so, though. “Oh? What kind of candy does she like? I might get her something next time too.”

“Lollipops and jelly beans.” He shifted the paper he was carrying and opened up the bag to show her. “She prefers fruit flavored things; she doesn’t really like chocolate yet. Maybe when she’s older, but not now.”

“Oh. I’ll try and remember that!” Ahiru’s eyes strayed to the other bag. “A-and what did you get? I got some fudge, and rock candy, and…” She opened her bag to show him. “Some gummi bears too!”

Fakir closed up the bag with Uzura’s candy in it and opened up the other one so she could see it. There was black licorice, some toffee bars, and something else she didn’t recognize. It was chocolate, but she couldn’t tell from the shape what it was. “Um, what’s that?” She pointed at the unfamiliar candy.

“Chocolate-covered marzipan.”

“Marzipan?” She tilted her head, her nose crinkling in confusion.

“Sweetened almond paste. You’ve never had it?” She shook her head. “…Do you want to try a piece?”

“What? Really?” Ahiru’s eyes widened. “Is – is that okay?”

Fakir let out an annoyed sigh. “I wouldn’t have offered if it wasn’t. Do you want one or not?”

“O-of course! Thank you!” Ahiru nodded. “But – but you have to try one of mine too, so it’s fair!” She reached into her bag and plucked out a piece of the fudge. “Here! This one is my favorite!”

He shook his head. “Then I shouldn’t take it, if it’s your favorite.”

“No, no, that’s exactly why I want you to try it!” Ahiru insisted. “Because it’s my favorite. Please?”

“… Fine.” He took the fudge piece and placed it in his candy bag, and then gave her one of the marzipans, which she put inside her own.

“Yay! I hope you like it!” Ahiru beamed at him, and then paused as something occurred to her. “Oh! Um, I, I don’t know when you’re heading back or anything, but I promised Uzura that I’d take a walk with her later and feed the ducks. Do you want to go with us?”

“No thanks.” He turned to walk away, but Ahiru followed him.

“Awww, but, but you wouldn’t be intruding or anything!” She gave up trying to catch up with him not even halfway down the street. “I think she’d be really happy if you came along!”

“I’m sure she would, but I have other things to do.” Fakir kept walking and didn’t turn around. “Maybe some other time.”

She brightened a bit at that. “Do you promise?” she asked, echoing Uzura’s question to her earlier that day.

“Maybe isn’t a promise.”

Ahiru pouted a little. “I – I’ll hold you to it, anyway! Cause Uzura would like it!”

“… Do what you want.”

“I will!” She smiled, though, behind his back, because she knew that he didn’t actually mind, regardless of what he said. For whatever reason, he was weird about showing how nice he really was, but now that she knew that, interacting with him had gotten a lot easier. It was a change she definitely appreciated.


	9. Chapter 9

Ahiru awoke on Friday morning from a strange dream that, for once, she remembered most of. It was vague and blurred around the edges, like a photograph that had been soaked in water, but the important details were clear enough. She had been in a large, candlelit classroom, and had been practicing her pronunciation of some phrase – it had been in her own language, but she’d needed to perfect some kind of foreign accent when saying it – while dozens of faceless students around her prepared ingredients for an unspecified potion. The class went on and on, while she said the phrase that she could now no longer remember over and over, never getting it right enough for the teacher even when it sounded correct to her. She wasn’t sure if the class had ended, but she knew that the last thing she remembered from the dream was a growing fear that she would come back the next day and have to do the same thing all over again, and meanwhile fall further and further behind the rest of the class, and probably never catch up. She laid there for a few minutes, trying to recall what else had happened in the dream, before finally rolling over and closing her eyes again.

The next time she woke up, Anne-Erina was shaking her frantically and babbling apologies for having been so late and racing through reasons why. Disoriented from weird dreams and oversleeping, Ahiru only managed to pick up bits and pieces of the maid’s rapid-fire rundown of her morning. Apparently she had overslept too, and then something had happened in the scullery – at least, that was what Ahiru thought she said – and the end result was that she had gotten up here far behind schedule, while someone else took care of her other duties. She was so late, in fact, that there wasn’t even time for Ahiru to take a bath, nor to redo her hair or put on her pendant. She instead had to hurriedly change from her nightclothes to a dress, and rush down the hall while still tugging on one of her shoes.

When she reached the playroom, Rue and Fakir were finishing their breakfasts, and she herself only had just enough time to eat half a piece of cold toast before Mr. Katz appeared at the doorway to summon them to class. Her late start had thrown her off so badly that it took her a bit longer to fully concentrate and settle into the day’s lessons, which irked Mr. Katz, but she eventually adjusted and was soon enough caught up and calmed down, and working quietly on the assignments.

“What happened this morning, Ahiru?” Rue asked her as they sat down for lunch. “You’ve been a little late before, but not like that. Is everything all right?”

Ahiru nodded as she reached for a sandwich. “Yeah, I… I didn’t mean to sleep in, but for some reason Anne-Erina was really really late and she didn’t wake me up in time and so I had to rush in here and I’m still not sure why she was so late, she tried to explain it but she was talking so fast and I wasn’t really awake so I didn’t hear all of it, I guess maybe I’ll have to ask her again later but that might be kinda awkward cause she thought I was listening before and I don’t want to hurt her feelings…” She paused to eat some of her sandwich, and then continued. “Um, anyway, sorry to worry you.”

“It’s fine, you don’t have to apologize for that.” Rue took a sip of her lemonade. “I’m just glad nothing is wrong.”

“Y-yeah, no, everything’s okay…” Ahiru let her gaze drop to her lunch as she spoke the lie, and hoped she wasn’t seen through. She didn’t want to mention that she was still slightly unsettled by her dream – it was a weird enough dream that she would’ve felt embarrassed to talk about it with them. Especially since, now that she thought about it, hadn’t the other students in it looked like they were multiple copies of Rue and Fakir? She hadn’t seen any of their faces, but she was sure she remembered that the hair styles and colors had been the same. Or maybe that was her mind playing tricks on her after her struggle to catch up to them during the morning lessons. She tried not to think about it, and instead focused on eating. Her breakfast had been so small that she’d been a little weak with hunger by the time lunch rolled around.

She couldn’t help but mull on it while she ate, though. She couldn’t remember what the teacher had looked like at all – he’d merely been a great, shadowy figure just out of sight in the dimly lit classroom. In fact, she couldn’t even remember seeing the teacher at all, or what his voice had sounded like, and so his gender was one of those things you just knew in a dream. There had been some kind of counter too, behind a small square-shaped hole cut in the wall, that the other students had retrieved things from while she sat at her desk and tried over and over to pronounce the phrase correctly. But no matter how many times she tried, it was never good enough for the perfectionist teacher. She’d heard that dreams were supposed to mean something and that there were ways to decipher your dreams, but she didn’t think she needed to ask anyone about the meaning of this one. It seemed pretty clear.

When they returned to the classroom after lunch, Ahiru was greeted by the wholly unexpected – and after her dream, rather eerie – sight of a small cauldron sitting on her desk, along with an assortment of herbs, a small knife, and a few bottles of colored liquids and powders. She frowned and looked over at their teacher. “Um, Mr. Katz, what’s this for?”

“I’m glad you asked, Miss Ahiru.” Mr. Katz stroked his mustache with one finger. “Since you have not yet been able to do other types of magic, I will be testing you on your ability to follow potion instructions. I myself will speak the required incantations as needed; I simply want to see how able you are to complete this task to my liking. You will chop the herbs and measure out the ingredients according to the recipe written on the chalkboard, and when it is heating you will keep watch over it so that you can stir and add the rest of the items at the correct intervals. Do you think you can manage this?”

“I – I’ll try!”

Mr. Katz’ mustache twitched. “Very well, then. Begin.” He pointed to where the directions were written on the chalkboard. “Be sure you read them carefully and do not skip any steps or attempt to cast spells. We don’t want any disasters on our hands.”

“Y-yes, of course…”

She was afraid of getting even the slightest thing wrong and further irking Mr. Katz, so Ahiru read over the instructions multiple times before beginning the preparations. She chopped the herbs slowly and carefully out of fear she would cut herself (and indeed nearly did, more than once), and her hands shook so badly when she measured out the ingredients from the bottles that it took her forever to do that step because of her terror that she would pour too much in. She eventually completed it, though, and timidly called Mr. Katz over. He made her review every step and, once satisfied that she had done them all and in the right order, performed a simple spell to summon fire in the specially prepared pit he’d set up on her desk beneath the cauldron.

Next came the boring part: watching and waiting for the right times to stir, or add a particular ingredient, or both. Ahiru braced her elbows on the desk and reread the potion instructions a few more times before returning her anxious attention to the cauldron. It had to come to a boil before she could stir it for the first time, and then after ten minutes of boiling, she needed to add a spoonful of powdered newt’s eye.

She began to grow progressively more nervous as the time ticked away, however – it was taking forever to boil, and she’d already gotten a late start because of how long she’d taken to read over the directions and prepare the ingredients. Rue and Fakir had to be almost finished with their work, right? What would happen if the lesson ended and she was still here working on her potion while they left? It was starting to feel uncomfortably close to the way her dream had gone. Oh, if only it would boil faster! She stared hard at the small flames flickering gently beneath the cauldron, wishing they were bigger so the potion would boil sooner and let her get to the next stage.

And then suddenly they were bigger. The little fire surged up with a mighty roar, engulfing the sides of the cauldron. It would’ve burned her if she hadn’t shrieked and pushed herself backwards, falling over in her chair in her haste to get away. She heard the scraping of other chairs on the floor, and then she was doused twice – first in warm liquid, as the potion exploded upwards out of the cauldron, and then cold as someone else – she couldn’t see who – summoned water to put out the flames. Stunned and shaken, she sat up to find that Rue had backed up against the windows, while Mr. Katz stood directly in front of her desk, wet and shivering and looking more displeased than she’d ever seen him.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” She turned to look at Fakir, who’d backed away too, but not in time to avoid getting splashed with the ruined potion. He was pale and breathing heavily, and looked absolutely furious. “You idiot! You can’t just – you can’t just go summoning fire to make it go faster or whatever damned stupid thing you thought you were doing!”

“But – but – I didn’t!” Ahiru shook her head. “I didn’t – I wasn’t –”

“Oh really? Explain that, then!” He gestured with a shaking hand at the mess on Ahiru’s desk. “There’s no use lying about it, we all saw what happened. What the hell were you thinking, doing something as moronic as that? Didn’t you listen at all to what he said?”

Ahiru’s lower lip trembled and she shrank beneath his accusing glare. Now she was wishing she could disappear under her ruined desk and hide. “I… I…”

“You really need to…” Fakir broke off, and shook his head. “I’m going to go change.” He strode out of the classroom without looking back, his pace unusually fast.

“I – I think I will too,” Rue said in an odd voice. She hurried out of the classroom after Fakir, and Ahiru heard her call his name as she followed him.

There was a long, awkward moment of silence before Ahiru dared to look again at Mr. Katz. His expression had changed into something she couldn’t quite read, and he sighed heavily as he met her gaze. “Miss Ahiru, please stay here and assist in cleaning this up. You can go change your clothes when we are finished.”

She gulped and nodded, not quite trusting herself to speak steadily with the lump that had formed in her throat and the tears that were pricking at her eyes. She didn’t talk the rest of the time she was in the classroom; she merely followed Mr. Katz’s instructions quietly. Once she had done all that she could do, with the rest of the cleaning and repair needing to be accomplished via magic, Mr. Katz sent her away and she all but ran back to her room. She didn’t know where Rue and Fakir were and she didn’t care as long as she didn’t have to see them right now. She sat down on the floor with her back against the door and cried for a long time before getting up and heading into the bathroom, where she ran a hot bath and unbraided her hair while she waited for the tub to fill up.

After she was done with her bath, Ahiru carefully dried and braided her hair, and then went back and laid down on her bed while still in her bathrobe, leaving her stained clothes in a pile on the bathroom floor. She clutched her duck pillow to herself and curled up in a ball as fresh tears spilled down her cheeks.

She’d messed up. She’d really messed up this time. Not being able to cast a spell was bad enough, but this? This was so much worse. This was so bad. The memory of Mr. Katz’ initial expression made her shudder, and she’d never seen Fakir so angry. Even Rue had been acting weird about it. The worst part was that she had no idea how she’d managed to do it. She’d only been thinking to herself that she wished the fire was a bit bigger so the potion would boil faster; she hadn’t actually done any magic that she knew of. She hadn’t been trying to perform any, because she knew Mr. Katz had told her not to. So how had it happened? That she didn’t know bothered her almost more than the reactions of the other three.

Ahiru stayed in her room for the rest of the afternoon, and didn’t bother to get up when she heard the gong ring for dinner. She still didn’t have it in her to face any of them, and so she’d decided that she would simply not show up. If someone came to ask why she wasn’t there, she would pretend to be ill. After what she’d done today, though, she very much doubted anyone would care enough to check on her. More likely, they would deliberate on what was to be done about her, and sometime tomorrow or maybe the next day they would give her the bad news that she couldn’t stay any longer and would have to go back to the orphanage.

Not long after dinner would’ve ended, however, there came a knock on her door. “Ahiru! Are you feeling okay zura? Rue said you weren’t at dinner zura!”

“Ahiru?” It was Rue. “Is everything all right? I didn’t see you at dinner, and I got worried. I was on my way here to check on you when Uzura found me and asked about you because you hadn’t shown up to go for a walk with her, either…”

“I…” Ahiru trailed off, and took a few deep breaths to try and steady her voice as she padded over to the door. “I – I’m okay. I just… I don’t feel so good, I think smelling that potion or something made me a little sick, but I’ll be fine, I don’t need to go to a doctor or anything, I already feel better than I did earlier. Don’t worry about me!”

“Um, okay…” Rue sounded doubtful. “You should eat something, though – it’s not a good idea to go to bed on an empty stomach.”

“Do you want us to bring you food zura?” Uzura piped up.

“N-no, no thank you, I – I’ll be fine. If – if I get hungry later, I’ll go down to the kitchen myself. I promise.” Ahiru could feel the tears starting to build up again, and she wanted to make Rue and Uzura go away before she broke down crying. She was going to miss them so much when she left. “I – I need to lie down again, so, so good night. Th-thank you for checking on me.”

“Ahiru, I…” Rue sighed. “No, never mind. Good night. I hope you feel better in the morning.”

“Me too zura!” Uzura banged one of her drumsticks against her little drum. “Sleep well zura!”

Ahiru listened to them walk away, the tears beginning to slide silently down her face. Only when she was sure they were far enough away did she rush back to her bed and bury her face in her duck pillow to muffle the sobs.


	10. Chapter 10

Rue and Fakir hadn’t been sitting at the table for long when the door to the playroom flew open with a loud bang. Even Fakir couldn’t pretend to ignore this, and turned an annoyed look towards the doorway at the same moment Rue sent a curious glance in its direction. They were both surprised, however, to find that the person who’d made such a loud entrance was not Ahiru, but Anne-Erina. Who was alone, and sagged with obvious despair and fright as her frantic scan of the room showed her they were the only ones there.

“Anne-Erina? Is something wrong?” Rue closed her book and got up from the table.

“Very… very wrong,” Anne-Erina panted. “Miss Ahiru, she’s… she’s not in her room! I rushed over here to see if she’d simply gotten up early and gotten ready on her own because she was afraid I’d be late again, but…” She wrung her apron in her hands, her enormous brown eyes brimming with tears. “Where could she be? You – you don’t think she’s run away, do you?”

“I certainly hope not!” Rue said with some alarm. “Tell me… did it look like any of her things were missing? Was her suitcase gone?”

“W-well… now that I think about it… no.” Anne-Erina shook her head. “It was still where it always is, and I don’t think anything was missing… she left her mother’s photo there on the table, I noticed that much… I’m sorry, I’m not very observant about these things, but I did see that.”

“That’s okay, it’s enough that you noticed that.” Rue patted her on the arm. “She wouldn’t leave the picture here if she meant to run away, so she’s still on the grounds somewhere. We’ll split up and find her.” Rue looked over her shoulder at Fakir, who was watching them with an unreadable expression on his face. “You too – we’ll be able to cover more ground with three of us looking. And –”

“I know.” Fakir closed his own book and got up. “Don’t worry about that.”

“Good.” Rue nodded. She pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket and offered it to Anne-Erina, who was trying to wipe her eyes with her apron. “There now, it’ll be all right, don’t cry. We’ll find her soon enough. You won’t get in trouble, I assure you, especially because it’s not your fault. And if anyone does get mad at you, I’ll vouch for you. So don’t worry, okay?”

Anne-Erina sniffled. “You – you’re too kind, Miss Rue. And so smart, and pretty… I wish I could be like you.”

“Nonsense.” Rue put her arm around her shoulders and gently led her back out the door. “You have to be yourself. And you’re fine the way you are.”

Fakir ignored their conversation as he followed them out of the playroom. He was busy extending his mind out over the castle grounds, trying to use the same magic that Ahiru herself had used to find Uzura last week. It wasn’t something he used often, so he wasn’t entirely sure of himself when he did, but this seemed as good a time as any to practice. There was a presence that was probably Ahiru hovering out in the general area of the flower gardens, so he’d try there first. If not, he’d continue to the orchards and then the duck pond.

He didn’t see her anywhere inside the gardens themselves, though he checked behind every tree and rosebush. But as he reached the other side, he saw it: the feather-like lock of bright hair that somehow always managed to stick straight up from her small head, extending like a beacon over the hedge at the end of the garden. He would’ve smiled at it if the reason for her being out here now wasn’t what it was. He kept walking, and as he passed under the arched trellis, saw her sitting with her back against the hedge, hugging her legs to herself. He couldn’t see her face, as she had her head down against her arms, but he could guess at what sort of expression she had.

“Ahiru?”

She started in surprise and looked up to see him standing by the trellis; he was frowning at her, but not in the usual way. He looked… concerned? That was a surprise too. “Fakir? Wh-what are you doing here? Shouldn’t you… shouldn’t you be in class by now?”

“No, it’s not quite time yet. And I’m out here to ask you that exact question.” He took a few cautious steps forward, not wanting to scare her. “Anne-Erina came in while we were waiting for breakfast, frantic because you weren’t in your room.”

“O-oh.” Ahiru’s gaze dropped to the dewy grass. “U-um, well, I… I just thought… I thought after yesterday that, that…”

“That you were banished from class or something?” Ahiru nodded. “Did Mr. Katz say you were?”

“No.” Ahiru shook her head. “He – he just… had me clean up what I could of… of the mess and then… told me I could go change while he fixed up the rest.”

“Then you’re not banished from class.” Fakir sat down about a foot or so away from her. “He’d have said so if you were.”

“How do you know?” Ahiru looked up at him again. “Have – have you gotten banished from class?”

“Yes.” For a moment, Fakir wanted to laugh, thinking back to the way their teacher had gotten so angry that he’d sounded almost like a yowling cat as he yelled, but he didn’t. “Just once.”

“Really?” Ahiru found that she couldn’t picture Fakir doing something to get himself banished from class, as temperamental as she already knew Mr. Katz could be. “How?”

“I’ll tell you some other time.” Fakir shook his head. “Right now, I need to…” He paused to take a deep breath. “I’m sorry. For yelling at you yesterday.”

Ahiru seemed to shrink in on herself at the mention of the incident. “It’s – it’s okay,” she mumbled, not looking at him. “It – it was pretty scary. I was scared too. I – I don’t blame you. Really.”

Fakir was quiet for a minute or so as he weighed something within himself. When he spoke next, it was in as carefully neutral a tone as he could manage. “I cast that spell once too. A long time ago.” Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ahiru peek up at him, her eyes and some of her freckles just barely visible above her arm. “I don’t remember why – maybe as practice, maybe to show I could. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter anymore, though. It… got out of control.” He thought he heard a tiny quacking noise, but that couldn’t have been – the ducks from the pond usually didn’t wander up this far. “I… escaped, thanks to Charon and Chrestomanci, but…” He took another deep breath to steady himself. “After I – recovered, Charon brought me to live here.”

“Oh… oh no…” Ahiru clapped a hand over her mouth as her eyes began to fill with tears. “Oh, Fakir, I… I…”

“I didn’t tell you that to make you feel bad. Or to justify what I said to you. I just wanted you to be able to understand why I acted that way. Uncontrolled magic is… it’s so easy to screw up and do something unforgivable.” He looked over at her. “I know you didn’t do it on purpose, but…”

“I did it somehow, though.” Ahiru wiped at her eyes. “I don’t understand how, but… but…” Her shoulders shook. “You – you weren’t really wrong, I was wishing that the fire would be a little bigger so that the potion would boil faster, because I was so afraid that I’d still be working on it when you and Rue were done with your work and I’d be there all night and then I’d really never catch up, just like in my dream, and… and…” She let out a little sob. “I – I don’t get how it happened, I wasn’t trying to make it bigger, I didn’t even think I could, you know that, you know I usually can’t do anything at all…”

“Yeah. That’s why it was stupid of me to accuse you of doing it intentionally.” Fakir sighed. “It was an accident. I know that now. I just… saw the flames and I… reacted without really thinking.”

“It’s okay, though.” Ahiru shook her head when he opened his mouth to protest that it wasn’t. “It is! Really! I understand why you did, and you’re right about how dangerous it can be, so – so it doesn’t bother me. I don’t want you to feel bad about it anymore. Okay?”

“… I’ll try.” He didn’t look at her as he said it, though, averting his eyes to the sky above their heads. “Anyway, you haven’t been banished from class, so you should come back. There was no need to worry everyone.”

“What’s the point?” Ahiru looked down again. “They’re – they’re just going to send me away. Back to the orphanage. Or somewhere else.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. They’re not going to do that.” Fakir shook his head. “Especially after what happened yesterday. Didn’t you listen to what I told you? Someone who can’t control their magic is a danger to themselves and others. They’re going to want to keep you here even more, so that you can be taught not only to use your magic, but to control it so things like that don’t happen again and get you or someone else hurt.”

“There’s nothing to control, though.” Ahiru’s voice was thick with tears again. “That – that was just some kind of, of fluke. I don’t have any magical power. Not an ounce. It’s not something I can do, I can’t do a thing.”

“Who told you that?”

“Huh?” Ahiru was caught off-guard by that one. She blinked through her tears at him, surprise and confusion on her damp face. “What do you mean?”

“Did you decide that on your own, or did someone else tell you that you can’t?” He was frowning again, but somehow the annoyance there didn’t seem directed at her. “The things you say – they don’t sound like your own words, not really. It sounds like you’re repeating what someone else told you, that you’ve taken to heart. Who was it – your previous teachers? People at the orphanage?”

Ahiru slowly shook her head. “W-well, I mean, they weren’t exactly nice about it either, but… but at that point I already knew I couldn’t do magic. Because my uncle told me.”

“… Did he? And what made him think that?”

“W-well, he, he could do magic – I think he was a warlock, but I don’t remember.” Ahiru sniffled and wiped at her eyes. “He had this workshop in his house, and I used to go in when he wasn’t there and look around at stuff… but he’d catch me and tell me about how I didn’t have any magic and I didn’t belong in there because that kind of thing wasn’t for me, I was just an ordinary person and shouldn’t poke my nose in. That magic was something for people who had the skill and – and the know-how, and I wasn’t one of those people.” She swallowed. “I asked him if he could teach me, but – but he said that there was no way even the best teacher could teach me magic, because I didn’t have any. I asked him how he knew that and he said that it was something he could just tell because of his power, and if I didn’t know that, then it proved I didn’t have any, and that I was asking too many nosy questions and he chased me out.”

“Hmph. If that’s what he really thought, then he must have been a third rate hack. At best.” Fakir couldn’t keep the disdain out of his voice. “I’m more inclined to trust Chrestomanci’s judgment on this. She knows what she’s doing, so if she recognized power within you, then it’s there. You just need to figure out what’s stopping you accessing it most of the time.”

“I don’t know how, though.” Ahiru’s shoulder slumped. “I try and I try, but it never seems like it’s enough. Sometimes I think that – that you or Rue should be the next Chrestomanci instead, because you two have no problem casting spells and you understand everything so easily and…”

“We can’t be, though. We’ve each only got the one life, like most people. Somewhere out there, in the other worlds in this series – maybe even in some other series – there are eight other duplicates of each of us, respectively. But there’s only one you.” He turned to look at her. “You have the magic power of nine people inside you, and all those extra lives. Only people like you can take over the office of Chrestomanci.”

“I don’t feel like I have nine people’s magic power in me.” Ahiru frowned down at the ground. “I just feel like… like a regular person. Nothing special. Especially cause… cause I don’t get all the theory stuff and how the spells work really or… how can I cast them if I don’t get it, on top of not having magical power?”

“I told you, you have it, you just need to find out what weakness is stopping you.”

“What if I can’t figure that out?” Ahiru asked in a small voice. “What if I never do catch up, what if I never get the hang of any of it?”

“You will. It just takes time, you have to be patient. If you’re really that worried, though… well…” Fakir hesitated. “I don’t know how much I can do, but… if you want, I could… I could help you study after class.”

“What?” Ahiru stared at him, her mouth falling open in surprise. “You – you’d help me? Really?”

“Just – just so – you do need to learn how to control it, so stuff like yesterday doesn’t happen again.” He could feel his face growing uncomfortably warm, and he avoided meeting her eyes. “And you said you didn’t want to fall behind, right? So – so if you want, I’d be – I’ll go over stuff with you so you can understand it all better. I mean, if you want.” He tried to keep his voice casual. “You don’t have to. If you’d rather study on your own that’s fine too.”

“N-no! I mean, yes! I mean – I’d really love that!” Ahiru’s face broke into the first real smile he’d seen from her in days. “Thank you so much! I think that’ll really, really help if you do that!”

“It – it’s no problem.” Fakir stood. “Come on, let’s go back inside and let them see you’re okay. And get some food. You must be really hungry, since you skipped dinner and now breakfast too.”

“N-no, I’m – I’m fine, really, I’m not –” Ahiru broke off as her stomach growled, betraying her hunger. She blushed. Above her, Fakir laughed, and it dawned on her that this was the first time she’d actually heard it. She’d seen it, that day with Uzura at the duck pond, but had been too far away at the time to hear his laugh. It was deep and warm and pleasant, and she realized that she not only liked it, but wanted to hear it more often.

“Come on, you. Up you get.” Fakir took her hands and pulled her up. She swayed, and clutched his hands for support as she rose unsteadily to her feet. She found herself strangely reluctant to let go, but did anyway once she’d balanced herself. “Let’s go eat. I’m hungry too.”

“Fiiiiiiine.” She stuck her tongue out at him, though she wasn’t really annoyed, and he laughed again. She opened her mouth to say something else, but was distracted by something out of the corner of her eye. “Oh… there it is again…”

“There’s what again?” He followed her gaze to the ruined wall off in the distance. “That wall?”

“Yeah.” Ahiru nodded. “I see it whenever I’m out here with Uzura, but it’s always in a different spot, and then when we get close to it, it moves away. She said it’s her mother’s private garden and no one is allowed in – is that true? I – I mean, I don’t think she was lying, but, but she sometimes gets strange ideas in her head…”

“Like thinking that Mr. Katz is a real cat?” Ahiru nodded again, and Fakir couldn’t help but allow a tiny smile onto his face. “To be fair to her, he does have some things in common with them. But yes… she’s right about that.” He stared out at the wall. “I only made it there once… and when I climbed up the stairs, one of those gardeners appeared and warned me off, telling me that exact thing: it’s forbidden to other people, only Chrestomanci can go in.”

“Really?” Ahiru’s eyes widened. “How did you get that close to it? Uzura and I have never been able to, it – it’s kind of a game with us to try.”

“I have no idea.” He turned and started walking back towards the castle, and Ahiru followed. “I wasn’t even trying to find it – I was going somewhere else and I suddenly wound up there purely by accident. I’ve never managed it since.”

“Hmmm. Maybe it can tell what our intentions are?” Ahiru pondered. “Um, on – on that subject, how did you find me? Did you use that magic you told me about?”

“A bit. But you’re also terrible at hiding.” He reached out and brushed his hand across her cowlick. “You gave yourself away.”

“Ah!” Ahiru’s face turned the same color as her hair and she clutched at the wayward lock, as if trying to smush it down onto her head. “I – I didn’t even – I thought the hedge was high enough! I wasn’t trying to be found!”

“I didn’t say you were. Just telling you that if you ever need to hide, you should pick a better spot and take that into account.”

“What’s the point? People will find me anyway by magic. Like you did.” Ahiru pouted for a moment. “I – I do feel bad about worrying everyone, though… do you think they’ll understand?”

“Yes. It’ll be fine. You don’t have to worry.” He looked over at her. “But you should definitely take a walk with Uzura later. She was upset when you didn’t show up yesterday.”

“I – I will!” Ahiru nodded. “I don’t want to make her sad again. Um, will you go with us this time? I – I know she’d really like that.”

“Not today.” Fakir shook his head. “I have to – get some stuff ready if I’m going to help you study. Come to my room after dinner and we’ll get started.”

“What about tomorrow?”

“For what?”

“For a walk with Uzura!” She elbowed him lightly. “Will you go with us tomorrow?”

He raised an eyebrow. “You’re really insistent about this, aren’t you?”

“For Uzura’s sake! She – she said she misses going with you but she likes going with me too, so she wants us both to go with her.” It was technically true, or at least close enough to what Uzura had actually said to be true.

He sighed. “Fine. Tomorrow it is.”

Ahiru brightened. “Is that a promise?”

“… Yes.”

“Oh! Thank you! Thank you so much! F-for Uzura! And…” She hesitated for a moment, and then threw her arms around him in a tight hug.

Fakir froze. His mind and heart were racing, but he otherwise couldn’t seem to move. “A-Ahiru? What are you doing?”

“I – I just – I just thought…” She pulled away, and he could see that her eyes were wet with tears again. “After what you told me… I just… I felt so sad for you, and I… I…”

“Idiot. You don’t need to cry for me.” He shifted uncomfortably, and fought the urge to reach out and wipe away the tears that were trickling down her cheeks. “I told you already, I didn’t tell you that story to make you feel bad.”

“I – I know you didn’t, I just…” She gave him a watery smile. “I feel like I understand you more now, you were kind of a mystery to me before but now I think I get it, and, and, um… well… I guess I just wanted to make you feel better cause I don’t want you to be sad, and – and I wanted you to know I don’t think you’re horrible or anything, not that I ever did to begin with, but… you know.” She lowered her gaze to their feet, her cheeks turning pink under the tear tracks.

“… Yeah. Well…” He swallowed. “… Thanks.” He turned away so that she wouldn’t see that he was blushing too, and resumed his walk back to the castle. It occurred to him to be grateful for her small size, because he was back to normal, or close enough, by the time she caught up with him again. “Anyway, don’t – don’t dwell on it, just focus on learning magic and controlling it. You have enough things of your own to worry about without trying to take on everyone else’s problems too.”

“I – I know I do, I just… can’t help it.”

“Idiot.” But he smiled at her, and she smiled back, as he opened the door to the castle and they walked in together.


	11. Chapter 11

True to his word, Fakir joined Ahiru and Uzura for their walk on their Sunday morning. They had a merry time together exploring the grounds, playing hide and seek in the flower gardens at Uzura’s insistence (and to the exasperation of the gardeners), feeding ducks at the pond, and attempting to reach the ruined wall. They had no success in that venture – not that they expected it, the fun being in the attempts themselves rather than in any expectation of making it there – but did find something that Ahiru had never seen before on her previous journeys with Uzura, and that even Fakir seemed surprised by. There was a tiny old stone gazebo hidden in a little glen, weather-stained and dusty, with vines starting to creep up its pillars. Uzura said she’d been there once, but Fakir couldn’t remember if he’d ever seen it. They entertained themselves by coming up with guesses and theories and little stories about its origins and why nobody seemed to use it anymore, until they all agreed that they were very hungry and it was probably time to head back for lunch.

When they did, they found a surprise: a large table laden with food had been set out on the lawn and Chrestomanci, Rue, Karon, Miss Goatette, and Mr. Katz were all there, beginning to dig in. Ahiru, Fakir, and Uzura sat down near Rue and talked to her about their adventures, while at the other end the adults discussed various topics. The lead Chrestomanci had gotten on the head of a smuggling ring that had called her away the day she’d meant to go shopping with Ahiru and Rue had not panned out, and the trail had gone cold since then, much to her frustration. Mr. Katz took over the conversation at one point to wax poetically about a play he had attended the previous night, becoming unexpectedly animated when discussing the portion depicting the marriage of the two main characters. This drew Uzura’s attention, prompting her to ask if the characters were lovey-dovey, and when it was confirmed, to inquire as to whether Mr. Katz was lovey-dovey with anyone. His reaction had been rather like watching a balloon deflate after letting the air out of it, while Miss Goatette had cast him a longing look for a very brief second. It all culminated in Uzura brightly wishing for him to find someone to be lovey-dovey with and have lots of kittens together, a wish that required a hasty and loud change of subject. The task was completed in tandem by Fakir, distracting Uzura with a tall tale about a griffin and a dragon flying over the orchards, and Karon, bringing up an experimental new project he was working on to strengthen various metals without the use of iron in the alloys.

They all went their own way after lunch, each occupied with their own pursuits, gathering again only at dinner. Mr. Katz was more subdued and Ahiru felt bad not only for him, but also for Miss Goatette, who obviously really was sweet on him, but was too shy to say so. It seemed rather sad to her, and she found herself hoping things would somehow work out for the two of them. Seeing them both unhappy and lonely seemed a bit too cruel otherwise.

After dinner, she had only just returned to her room and was looking for where she’d put a particular book when someone knocked on her open door. She turned around, smiling, only to become confused when she saw Miss Goatette standing there. “Um, is Uzura is missing again?”

“No, not at all.” She shook her head. “It’s her bedtime, and she’s fine, but she’s insisting that you read her a story before she goes to sleep. I told her I would ask you if she promised not to run off, but if you’re too busy, I’ll try to explain that to her…”

“No, no, I can do that!” Ahiru smiled again. “I don’t mind.”

“Oh, good.” Miss Goatette’s shoulders sagged in relief. “Thank you so much, Miss Ahiru – I don’t like to think of what would’ve happened otherwise. N-not to pressure you or anything, just… just…”

“No, I understand, it’s okay!” Ahiru followed her down the hall to Uzura’s room. She’d learned by now that Uzura’s room was the first one on the corridor, followed by Rue’s, and then Fakir’s, and her own was of course at the very end. She was supposed to be joining Fakir for another study session tonight, but he was off in the library looking for anything that might help them, so she figured she had enough time to read Uzura her story first.

Uzura had already been tucked into bed, and her little face brightened when she saw Ahiru enter her room. “Ahiru! You’re going to read me a story zura?”

“Yes, I am.” Ahiru smiled and sat down in the small chair next to Uzura’s bed. There was a picture book on the bed, evidently Uzura’s choice of reading material for the evening. It was a library book, labeled as being from World 5-D, and there were mermaids on the cover. “This is the book you want?”

“Yes zura. I like the mermaids zura. Have you ever seen any zura?”

“No.” Ahiru shook her head. “Have you?”

“I haven’t either zura. Mama says we’ll go see them next summer zura. She’ll get a house on a private island there zura. I want to go swimming and see the mermaids’ tails zura.”

“Yes, Rue mentioned that we might all go next summer! It sounds like fun!” Even more so now that she knew she was definitely staying and would be there to go with them. For a moment, her thoughts drifted to wondering what Fakir would wear to go swimming, and her face grew unexpectedly hot at the idea. She gave her head a quick little shake, as though she was trying to wake herself up, and opened up the book. “U-um, so… Once upon a time, there was a beautiful island…”

She didn’t hear the footsteps outside, but Fakir heard her voice as he drew close to Uzura’s room, his arms full of new books he hoped would help them puzzle out what Ahiru’s weakness could be. He stopped to listen, a smile spreading over his face almost before he realized it. There was something indescribably cute about Ahiru’s voice as it was, but hearing her read to Uzura made it even more so. She tried her best to give the narration portions of the book the proper inflections, and was surprisingly good at doing different voices for each of the characters. She was patient with Uzura when the little girl interrupted to ask her things, and her reading style was clearly a hit, producing gasps and giggles at exactly the right moments.

“Ahiru?”

“Yes, Uzura?” She had just finished reading the story, “the end” barely out of her mouth when Uzura spoke up again with another question.

“I forgot to ask earlier zura. Do you like Fakir?”

“Yes, I do,” Ahiru replied cheerfully and without hesitation, before Fakir even had time to take another breath. “He’s very nice, isn’t he? I had a lot of fun on our walk today.”

“So you’re friends zura?”

“Yes, we are.” Ahiru placed the book back on the little shelf beside Uzura’s bed and stood up. “Now, the story is over, so it’s time for you to go to sleep.” Outside, Fakir hurried back the way he’d come as quickly and quietly as possible. “Goodnight, Uzura. We’ll play again tomorrow afternoon.”

“Goodnight zura.”

Ahiru bent and kissed Uzura’s forehead, and then doused the lamp. As she quietly shut the door, Fakir came back around the corner. Ahiru smiled as she saw him. “Oh! Fakir! Did you just get back from the library?”

“Y-yeah. Are you ready to get started, then?”

“Yes! I was just reading a bedtime story to Uzura, cause she really wanted me to, and I was hoping I wouldn’t take too long and be late, but you actually have really good timing cause I just finished.” The look of momentary relief that passed over Fakir’s face as he realized that she didn’t suspect anything odd went completely unnoticed. “Does she ever have you read her stories too?”

“Sometimes. Her mother usually reads to her, but occasionally she wants me to, or Rue.”

“Oh, that’s nice of you two to do. I’m sure you’re really good at it.” Ahiru was trailing behind Fakir as he led the way back to his room, and so she also missed the blush that crept across his face at her compliment. Likewise, he missed the pink that spread across her cheeks as she thought about listening to Fakir telling a story and how perfect a voice he had for it. “Oh! I – I keep forgetting to tell you, but, but I tried that candy you gave me. I really, really liked it! Did you eat the fudge?”

“Yeah. It was really good – I could tell why it’s your favorite.” He’d had it before, so it had been nothing new for him, but he didn’t want to tell her that. And now it would always remind him of her.

“Oh, I’m glad!” Ahiru beamed at him. “We should go to the candy store together sometime and pick out stuff for each other to try! There’s so much I’ve still never had…”

“… Yeah.” He held the door open for her so she could go in, and then followed her and headed to his desk.

“What are we going to try tonight?” Ahiru asked as Fakir deposited his stack of books on one end of his desk. She seated herself in the chair he’d summoned up from the dining room table the previous evening and positioned at the other end of his desk, close to where his own chair was. “Another spell?”

“No, not yet.” He opened up her copy of Magic for Beginners and flipped to a section early in it. “Read this while I look through the books I got on magical weaknesses, and then we’ll discuss it afterwards.”

“Okay.” Ahiru focused her attention on the textbook, while Fakir sat down and started looking through the book that was on top of the stack he’d brought in. She hadn’t been reading for very long, however, when she sensed something and looked up to see Fakir staring at her. “Wh-what is it?” she asked, starting to blush again under the intensity of his gaze. “Is – is something wrong?”

“Take your necklace off.”

“Huh?” She blinked. She hadn’t been expecting him to say that. She wasn’t sure what she had been expecting, but that would not have made the list. “Wh-why?”

“Just do it.” His gaze dropped to the gem around her neck. “I have an idea. I could be wrong, but – well, I don’t think I am. But I need you to take that off first.”

“Um, o-okay.” Ahiru reached up and unclasped the pendant. Fakir held out his hand, and she laid it in his palm, her fingers lightly brushing the inside of his wrist. He set it down on the desk, and then retrieved the small hand mirror she’d brought in last night when they tried the floatation exercise.

“Now try levitating this.” He pushed it in front of her so that she could see her reflection. “Read over the spell again if you don’t remember the words.”

“I – I remember them.” She’d tried the spell enough times by now to have memorized it. She drew a deep breath and began to turn the mirror counterclockwise.

As it happened, she didn’t need the words at all. On the second turn, the mirror rose into the air. So did the desk, the chairs they were sitting in, the bookshelf, the rugs on the floor, his wardrobe, and even the bed. “Waaaah?!” Ahiru exclaimed, at the same moment that Fakir reached over and grabbed her hand. She felt something pass through her from him, and as they and the objects she’d floated began to slowly descend and land with gentle “whump!”s she realized that he was using his power to help her carefully guide everything back down without breaking any of it or getting the two of them hurt. Their chairs rocked a little as they settled onto the floor, but remained upright in the end.

They were still staring at each other, wide-eyed and silent, when a door not too far down the hall slammed open and footsteps marched at a rapid pace towards Fakir’s room. They just barely had the presence of mind to let go of each other’s hands as Rue stormed in with a cross look on her face. “Fakir, I realize I told you to grow a sense of humor, but I’d appreciate if you did it in a way that does not involve levitating my chair four feet in the air while I’m in it. It’s nice that you at least didn’t drop me on the floor, but please – try a funny book or something next time.”

Fakir found his voice first, and it was a measure of how stunned he still was by what had happened that he didn’t get even slightly defensive or irritated with Rue. “That wasn’t me. I… I think we just found Ahiru’s weakness.”

“What?” Rue’s annoyance instantly transformed into wonder and excitement. “Really? What is it?”

“I’m not sure exactly what it is, but it’s something in this necklace.” He held it up by its chain, and turned his gaze back to Ahiru as Rue took hold of it and examined it. “I remembered that you weren’t wearing it on Friday, or that day when you found Uzura by magic, so I thought there might be a connection.”

“Wow… you have a really good memory, Fakir!” Ahiru’s eyes shone with admiration. “I… I can’t believe it… what part of the necklace do you think it is?”

“Hmmm… it’s either the iron chain or the ruby.” Rue frowned as a thought occurred to her. “Ahiru… didn’t you tell me that this isn’t the original chain for this necklace?”

“Yeah.” Ahiru nodded. “The other one broke, so my uncle replaced it with this. You can see the old gold one in my mother’s picture; I’ve never seen it for myself though. It was…” She trailed off as she saw the looks Fakir and Rue exchanged. “What? What is it?”

“Let me get this straight, Ahiru,” Rue said slowly. “You never once saw the original gold chain for yourself outside the photograph? How did you get this necklace, then?”

“Um, my uncle gave it to me.” Ahiru thought back. “It was a belated birthday present. He told me he’d found it in a box in the attic, but the chain was broken, so he’d gotten a new one as a surprise and it was late cause making it took so long.”

“He’s the one who told her she didn’t have any magic, and he refused to try and teach her when she asked.” Fakir gave Rue a meaningful look.

“I see.” Rue’s eyes narrowed as she stared at the chain.

“You think – you think he did it on purpose?” Ahiru’s voice trembled. “You think he – you think he knew? Why – why would he do something like that?”

“I have no idea,” Rue said, shaking her head. “I never met him. The only thing I know is that even in this world, so rife with magic, there are people who are fearful and suspicious of it for various reasons, and would be displeased to find it in their child. And so they’d try to suppress it in any way they could.”

“But – but he could use magic too! He was a warlock, and he’d chase me out of his workroom, and he had strange people over all the time to pay for his services or deliver stuff to him. Why would he want to take away my magic instead of trying to make me help him?” It didn’t make any sense to her.

“Who knows?” Rue shrugged. “Maybe he had a fortune telling done that he wrongly interpreted. Maybe he was jealous that you had more power. I don’t know because I wasn’t there. In any case, we don’t know that it’s the chain itself, we still have to test this. I have a ruby that’s come free of its brooch that I’ve been meaning to take to Karon for repair, let me go get it.”

Rue rushed out of the room to go look for the ruby, and Fakir studied Ahiru’s face. All the excitement over having finally found what was preventing her from using magic had been replaced with a sort of pale, wounded expression. Clearly, it was one thing for her uncle to make a mistake about her magical powers and treat her with disdain over her apparent lack of them, but another one entirely if he had purposely blocked her abilities and then treated her terribly for not being able to access what he’d sealed off.

“Ahiru?” She turned to look at him. “You know, it’s – it’s entirely possible that he was telling the truth about the original chain, and bought this one because he couldn’t afford another gold one, or was just too cheap to buy one. It might really be a coincidence.” Deep down, he didn’t really think so, but the hurt in her eyes was too much to bear. “Or it might be the ruby. We can’t rule that out either until we’ve tried.”

Ahiru nodded, still looking wan. “I – I guess so…”

“Either way, though, it doesn’t make the way he treated you okay.” Fakir’s expression hardened. “You shouldn’t forget that – even if he didn’t know what he was doing, it was still wrong of him to treat you the way he did over your perceived lack of magic. There’s nothing that makes that all right.”

“I – I know. I just –” Ahiru broke off as Rue came back into the room, brandishing a small square-cut ruby.

“Found it!” Rue took Ahiru’s hand and placed the ruby there. “Okay, now try casting something – probably the levitation spell would be best.”

Ahiru obeyed her. As it had earlier, the mirror rose into the air, along with the desk, their chairs, and a few other things. Fakir took her hand again and helped her set them all back down carefully.

“Looks like it’s the iron, then,” Rue said, wincing slightly as Ahiru’s face fell. “Cheer up, this is good, because it means that you’ll still be able to wear your mother’s necklace. We just have to take it to Charon and have him make another chain for it, and then you’ll be able to keep wearing it and casting spells. And that’s the most important thing, really: that you found out what was stopping you doing that and you can start really learning magic now.”

“Yeah… yeah, you’re right.” Ahiru tried to smile. She really did know that that was the most important part of what had happened tonight, and she really was excited and happy about finally being able to cast spells. It hurt to think that it was something that had been done to her on purpose by her own family, but she was determined not to let it ruin this triumph for her. She turned a stronger, more genuine smile on Fakir. “Tha-thank you, Fakir. I don’t know if I would’ve found it out without you. Thank you so much!”

“It – it’s no big deal.” He looked a little flustered. “I’m just glad you know now so you can start using and controlling your magic.”

“Yeah.” Ahiru let out a happy little sigh of relief. “Me too.”


	12. Chapter 12

Two weeks passed in which Ahiru continued to make slow but mostly steady progress in her magic lessons. Her magic itself was erratic and varied in strength, but she made efforts towards controlling it and learning spells. She still studied with Fakir every night, and often Rue joined them as well. They’d taken her pendant down to Karon’s forge the day after the discovery of her weakness, and explained the situation. He’d agreed to take on the task of making an iron-free chain to attach to the jewel, but warned them that it might take a little extra time, as his technique with the new alloys was still highly experimental and he had a lot of other work to do besides. He instructed them to come back in a couple of weeks, and so the three of them did just that on a chilly Saturday afternoon after class.

“Charon?” Fakir knocked on the forge door, which had been left slightly ajar. Ahiru was close behind him, and Rue just behind her. “Are you here?”

“Ah, Fakir.” The blacksmith smiled as he walked out from behind a shelf piled high with weapons and other objects. “Good to see you – and Ahiru and Rue too. How’s that sword of yours? Does it need any maintenance?”

“I don’t know.” Fakir fidgeted and avoided the man’s eyes. “I haven’t actually used it in a while.”

Ahiru looked up at him wonderingly. “I didn’t know you could use a sword.”

“Well, if I tried now, I’d be a little rusty,” he admitted. “It’s an old hobby, something I used to do in my spare time. But it fell by the wayside some time ago, because I wanted to concentrate on my – on other things.” He coughed. “I haven’t actually practiced in months.”

“That’s a shame, you were very gifted with it. You let me know if you ever need me to sharpen it, all right?” Charon smiled. “Now then, I suppose you three are here about that pendant of Ahiru’s?”

“Yes!” Ahiru nodded, her eyes lighting up with hope. “Is – is the chain ready?”

“It is, yes. Just a moment.” He smiled and walked over to his workbench, where he retrieved Ahiru’s pendant. It was now on a golden chain that shone prettily in the lamp light. “Here you go. I hope it’s to your tastes.”

“It looks perfect!” Ahiru took it carefully from him and fastened it around her neck. “Thank you so much!”

“You’re very welcome. Now, you three run along, I’ve still got to prepare for tonight’s dinner party. Chrestomanci’s guests are very important, and I don’t wish to embarrass her.” He ushered them out the door. “I’ll see you all some other time.”

“Guests?” Ahiru said blankly as the door shut behind them.

“Don’t you remember?” Rue prodded her. “Chrestomanci is entertaining a royal family from World 7-E tonight. We’ll all be eating together in the playroom while she entertains them.”

“Oh yeah… I forgot…”

“They’ve been over quite a few times in the past few years,” Fakir said as they walked back towards the main part of the castle. “They’re important allies of Chrestomanci’s that you should probably expect to deal with a lot when you assume the role yourself.”

Ahiru shuddered. “I hope that’s not any time soon, I’m not ready at all.”

“Don’t worry, she still has most of her lives left,” Rue assured her. “You have plenty of time to learn everything you need to know for that eventual day.”

“That’s good.” Ahiru brightened at that.

As they passed into the main hall, they found they’d come back just in time to witness the royal family’s arrival. Chrestomanci was speaking with the king and queen, while their son hung back just behind his parents. He was a slender, delicate-featured young man with feathery white hair, who looked like he could be around Fakir’s age, though it was hard to tell; as they moved towards the staircase, he turned his head and glanced over at them. He smiled as his eyes fell on Rue, and she in turn blushed and smiled back before averting her gaze.

“Was that the prince?” Ahiru asked as they climbed the stairs.

“Yes.” Rue’s blush deepened. “He – he always comes with his parents on these official visits. He’s very kind, not at all stuck up like you’d expect royalty to be – I was pleasantly surprised when I first met him. He gets along well with everyone.”

Ahiru couldn’t help but giggle. “Including you?”

“W-well, of course!” Rue looked flustered. “I did say everyone, didn’t I? That includes me, you know.”

“I’ll have to meet him sometime, then.” Ahiru smiled at her. “Someone so nice and handsome must be a great prince. And Rue, you’re so pretty and smart, I bet you’d make a perfect princess!”

“Wh-what’s that supposed to mean?” Rue’s blush deepened. “I – I’m not – he’s my friend, that’s all! And he’s from another series entirely, besides!”

“What does that have to do with anything?” Ahiru asked, looking confused.

“Well – well, there’s, there’s –” Rue fumbled. “It – it would be difficult, is all… n-not that I’ve thought about it or anything, of course!”

“Of course not.” Ahiru hid another giggle as she followed Fakir into the playroom. Inside, the table was already set for dinner and the lamps had been lit, but no food had arrived yet so the three each retrieved their respective books and settled down to entertain themselves while they waited. It was well past sunset when Anne-Erina bustled in, got their food from the dumbwaiter, set it on the table, and bustled back out in a hurry.

“Does Chrestomanci have parties like this a lot?” Ahiru asked as they ate. Some of the dishes she recognized, but others were unfamiliar; they must have been native to World 7-E. They were pretty good, even if trying them required a bit more bravery than normal.

“I wouldn’t say a lot, but it happens on a somewhat regular basis.” Rue took a sip from her glass. They’d been served some kind of strange, pale green beverage that was somewhere in between thick and thin, and had a somewhat musty yet sweet flavor to it. “Eventually, you’ll have to start attending them, but not for a while yet, I shouldn’t think. But you will have to start meeting all the various diplomats and heads of state and officials and whatnot that she deals with. It’s important for them to know you and be comfortable with you before you take the office, and when you’re older and done with your training, you’ll likely be assisting her on business anyway.”

“Oh.” Ahiru stared down at her mostly emptied plate. “I… I hope I do a good job. I don’t want to be a bad Chrestomanci.”

“That’s what all the training you’re getting now is for.” Fakir drained the last of his own glass. “You shouldn’t worry too much about it. Like she said, you still have a lot of time left to get ready even for helping with the job. The most important thing is to focus on doing your best in your studies right now.”

“That’s true.” Ahiru pushed her plate away and glanced at the other two. “Um, what do we do now? We’re not supposed to go downstairs, right?”

“No, but I think I will anyway.” Rue dabbed delicately at her mouth with her napkin before standing up. “Just to say hello, you understand.”

“To the prince?” Ahiru grinned up at her.

“I did say we were friends, and it would be rude of me not to at least greet a friend, right?” Rue winked. “I’ll see you later.” She sailed out the door, looking quietly excited.

As soon as her footsteps disappeared down the hall, Ahiru giggled. “She really does have a crush on him, doesn’t she? And he seemed happy to see her too!”

“Yes. And she has ever since she first met him a few years ago.” Fakir shrugged as he too rose from the table. “I barely know him myself, so I couldn’t tell you anything about him.”

“Oh, that’s okay, I just think it’s nice for Rue.” Ahiru smiled fondly. “I think they’d make a really cute couple. Um, anyway, what do you want to do tonight? I know we’re not allowed downstairs, but um… I was thinking…”

“You were thinking what? Just say it.”

“W-well, I haven’t really gotten to explore the entire castle yet, at least not some parts so – so I was wondering if – if maybe… maybe you’d want to show me around one of the areas I haven’t been to?” She gulped nervously.

Fakir considered it. “Where haven’t you been?”

“Well, um…” Ahiru thought about it. “I haven’t gone up in many of the towers, cause I was kinda scared of all the stairs for a while, but maybe it won’t be as bad if I’m not alone cause then if I trip or something you’ll be there to catch me and I won’t lose another life falling down again.”

For a moment, Fakir got a strange look on his face, but it was so fleeting that Ahiru wasn’t sure if she’d actually seen it or not. “If you’re too afraid of the stairs still, we don’t have to go in any of the towers. You’ll eventually learn to teleport places, so you can do that later if you ever need to go up there.”

“No, I want to!” Ahiru shook her head. “I’m really really curious about them, and I’m not as scared now as I was when I got here, and besides, you’ll be with me! I mean, um…” Her cheeks pinkened a little. “Will you come with me? Please?”

He nodded. “Yeah. Someone has to make sure you don’t get hurt, after all.”

Ahiru beamed at him. “Oh, thank you!”

On their way to the staircase leading up to the next floor, they caught sight of Rue heading down the one that led to the ground floor. She’d changed her clothes and put her hair up, and in the dim light of the lamps, it seemed like she’d put on some makeup too. Ahiru watched her go, and ended up walking into a wall.

“Owwww,” she groaned, rubbing her nose as she stumbled back.

“Idiot. You need to look where you’re going.” Fakir scowled. “You’re not going to be this careless on the stairs, are you?”

“N-no. I promise I’ll be careful.”

“Good. Because if you’re not, we’re going to come back down here. Your lives aren’t infinite, you know.”

“I know that.” Ahiru scowled back at him. “I have a lot more than you – you only have the one. It’s more important for you to be careful!”

“I am careful, for that exact reason.” Fakir folded his arms, not budging. “Yours aren’t something you should treat like – like things you can just toss away, they’re all valuable. It’s more important for you to be careful.”

“What, just cause I’m the next Chrestomanci?” Ahiru shook her head. “That doesn’t make me more important than you!”

“Actually, it does, and – oh, never mind.” He turned away and began walking again.

Ahiru pouted at his back as she followed him. “I think you’re wrong, I think you’re important too. At least, you are to me, cause you’re my friend. And, and also, if being the next Chrestomanci is important, then so is being the Chrestomanci’s friend. And I don’t think anyone’s more or less important than anyone else, anyway. Everybody’s got their own unique value, you know?”

“Maybe.” He paused as they reached the stairs up to the next floor. “Here, you go first – if you trip, I’ll be right behind you so you don’t fall down.”

“O-okay.”

She went ahead of him up the stairs, and he followed close behind. She climbed slowly, and worried more than once that she was going to irritate him by making such glacial progress, but he never showed any sign of it. He took the lead again when they got to the next floor, as he knew the way to the next set of stairs better, falling behind only when they had to go up. At last, they made it to a door on the fifth floor that opened up to a staircase that spiraled up the inside of a tower. Ahiru took a deep breath, her heart racing with excitement, and began to carefully ascend, gripping the bannister tightly. She knew she couldn’t fall off the edge, protected as she was by the railing on one side and the tower wall on the other, but it was still very dizzying to be up so high, and the only thing that helped her stay calm was knowing that Fakir was right behind her.

The first door they came to was locked. Not physically, but magically – the knob turned, but the door wouldn’t open, and there was the feeling of a strong spell laid upon the hinges. Fakir shook his head. “Whatever’s in this room, we’re not supposed to see. Let’s move on.”

They walked up a ways further, and came to another room, one that actually opened. Ahiru was delighted when it swung open with a loud creak, but delight soon became disappointment when all that was inside were a few broken chairs and a round dusty window. “Awwww… that’s boring. I wonder why nobody uses this room.”

Fakir shrugged. “Maybe whoever used to use it moved out, and nobody else has wanted it since. There are a lot of mysterious things in this castle.”

“Yeah, there are.” Ahiru turned around and smiled at him. “I like that! It makes it fun to explore! Did you go exploring like this when you first came to live here?”

“Not really, not at first.” He stepped aside so that she could return to the stairs, and closed the door behind her before following. “When I first got here, I… I didn’t really want much to do with any of it. It was only later after I accepted that I had to stay and learn to control my magic instead of trying not to use it at all that I started taking an interest in looking around.”

“Oh yeah, you…” She looked back at him over her shoulder. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring up bad memories or anything.”

He shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. It happened a long time ago, and I was already thinking about my first time exploring this place anyway.”

“If – if you say so…” Ahiru sighed as she resumed the ascent up the stairs. “Did you ever come here back then? Do you remember what that little room used to be for?”

“I did, but I don’t remember. I think it may have been locked like the first one, but I’m not sure. I didn’t go in these towers too often.” Ahead of him, she stumbled a little, and he caught her around her waist and steadied her. “Careful now.”

“I – I know,” Ahiru said, a bit breathlessly. “Th-thank for you catching me.”

She walked more slowly and carefully after that, watching each step so she didn’t trip again. After what felt like an eternity of climbing, they came to one last door at the very top of the tower. Ahiru tested it, and to their surprise it not only swung open easily, but was a very interesting room indeed. It was a workshop of some sort, with a five-pointed star painted on the floor, and several large tables with various items scattered across them, as well as shelves on the wall crammed full of jars and bottles of varying shapes and sizes, with labels slapped crookedly onto them.

“Woooow…” Ahiru started forward, gaping at all the things around them. “Who do you think uses this room?”

“I don’t know.” Fakir switched on the lamp, and the whole room was then bathed in a soft and somewhat eerie glow. “Mr. Katz, probably.”

Ahiru giggled. “I can just imagine what Uzura would say: it’s because cats like high places.”

Fakir laughed. “That sounds like her.”

They both edged around the star on the floor, not wanting to scuff the paint with their shoes, despite logically knowing that it had most likely been reinforced by magic. Fakir studied some of the things laid out on the tables, while Ahiru peered at the things in jars on the shelves. She got brave enough after a while to open a few and peek in. A few of them had strange liquids inside, one of which was multicolored and bubbled and hissed up at her. Another one had the eyes of some creature or other, and she made a face before hastily returning it to the shelf. Still another had blue sand with a faint scent of jasmine flowers and cinnamon. She liked that one.

She ended up going around the whole room in a circle, with the last shelf a few feet away from the table where Fakir was flipping through a slightly shabby grimoire. There was a jar on that table too, with some kind of dark red liquid inside it, and she didn’t see a label on it. Unable to help herself, she cautiously unscrewed the lid and bent over the jar. A strong, offensively unpleasant smell hit her instantly, and she stumbled backwards, dropping the metal lid onto the floor with a loud clunk.

“Ahiru!” Fakir dropped the book back onto the table and rushed forward, catching her before she could collapse. “Are you all right?”

“I…” Her vision swam and she doubled over in his arms, clutching her stomach. “I don’t… I don’t feel so good…” Her eyes were watering and she felt dangerously close to vomiting. “That smell… I…” She covered her mouth with one hand and shuddered.

“Here, sit down.” Fakir led her over to the other end of the bench and helped her sit. He then went back over to the jar and retrieved the lid. He replaced it while keeping as a safe distance from the jar as he could, and then turned it around to see the label. His eyes widened. “This is dragon’s blood… it’s very dangerous. And illegal.”

“What’s…” Ahiru took a few gulping breaths and wiped at her eyes. “What’s it doing here, then?”

“I don’t know, and right now I don’t care.” He walked back over and helped her stand up. “Let’s get you out of here and away from it.”

Ahiru simply nodded, not wanting to open her mouth to speak anymore in case she threw up on him. He helped her walk carefully back down the winding staircase and out of the tower. She held onto him for support the entire way back, and was looking a little less pale by the time they got back to the playroom, though still slightly shaky. She sank with no small amount of relief into one of the armchairs, while Fakir summoned up a pot of ginger tea from the kitchens. He poured some of the steaming liquid into one of the unused cups on the table, and brought it over to her, taking her hands and gently wrapping them around it.

“Drink that, it should help.” Ahiru nodded and took a cautious sip. The warmth spread through her and soothed some of her nausea, which encouraged her to keep drinking it.

“Th-thanks.” He was hovering near her, a concerned look on his face. “I… I don’t know why it had that effect on me.”

“It has a really powerful smell, so it’s only natural.” Fakir pulled a chair from the table over so that he could sit beside Ahiru. “I’m not surprised it bothered you. I learned about it in class last year, and Mr. Katz said that it takes getting used to, especially the liquid form. And that was your first time, so…”

“Actually, um… I don’t think it was.” Ahiru frowned down at the rest of her tea, which was still wafting little clouds of steam up at her. “I feel like… I feel like I’ve smelled it before somewhere.”

“Really?” He raised an eyebrow. “Not that I don’t believe you, but as I said, it’s illegal. Since this is Chrestomanci Castle, the stuff up in that workroom must have been confiscated from someone, but if you smelled it before… well, whoever had it was breaking the law.”

“Well, I could be wrong,” Ahiru admitted. She drank the last of the tea. “It did smell really familiar, though.”

“If you think you smelled it before, you probably did. You shouldn’t doubt yourself so much.” Fakir took the empty cup from her hands and stood up. “And it’s a pretty distinctive odor, anyway. Do you want more tea?”

“Um, sure.” Ahiru nodded. “Thank you.”

He poured her more and brought it back. “Do you feel any better now?”

“Y-yeah.” Ahiru took the cup and drank some more tea. “I still feel kinda woozy, but I don’t feel like I’m going to throw up, at least.”

“That’s good.” Fakir sat down. “You should go to bed when you feel ready, though, and take it easy. Even the more common powdered form is dangerous, so it’s no wonder you felt sick after getting a blast of the liquid like that.”

“Really? Ugh.” Ahiru shuddered. “Why does anyone use it, then?”

“Because some powerful spells require it. You and I don’t need it because we’re enchanters, but for people who have to rely on ingredients to perform magic, it’s essential for some things. It goes for exorbitant prices on the black market; some people have been known to make fortunes by smuggling it in. At least, until they get caught.”

“Smuggling it in? Where does it come from?”

“Series Eight is the only one that has dragons native to it, so it comes from there.” He leaned back in his chair. “Anyway, we can’t tell anyone this happened or that we were up there, so we should probably just say, if we’re asked, that we stayed here and studied or read or something.”

“Yeah. Rue will probably make fun of us for being boring, but that’s better than it getting back to Mr. Katz or somebody and getting in trouble.” She smiled. “And it’s kind of neat that way, anyway: it’s our secret little adventure together.”

“You’re right, it is.” He smiled back at her, and she felt a strange fluttering inside that had nothing to do with the effects of the dragon’s blood. She ended up staying up later than she should’ve to talk more with him, until her body’s desire to be lying down in bed instead of sitting upright could no longer be ignored, and she had him help her to her room.

When she was awakened in the middle of the night by an uncomfortable dream she soon forgot the details of, it was the memory of Fakir’s smile that chased the fear away, and she slept easier until morning.


	13. Chapter 13

Ahiru awoke with a start on Thursday morning from a rather terrifying dream about being chased by a giant owl with mad eyes. For a brief, horrible moment, she thought the noise coming from outside the window she’d mistakenly left open was the ticking of a very loud clock, but she relaxed when she realized that it was only the steady drumming of rain against the castle’s tiled roof. She lay in bed and watched it pour down outside her window while she forced herself to breathe more easily and waited for her heart to stop pounding in fright. She’d been having bad dreams ever since she’d inhaled the odor of the dragon’s blood on Saturday night, but this was the first one she’d actually remembered upon waking up. She’d jolted awake just as the owl had opened its beak, and she vaguely recalled feeling like something even worse was going to come out of its gaping maw. She forced herself to think instead of the fun she’d had with Fakir and Rue in the village yesterday, visiting both the candy store and the bakery and loading themselves up on sweets. It worked to some degree, but she still hadn’t completely shaken off her uneasiness by the time she sat down to breakfast, and she picked at her food while the other two ate.

“Are you feeling all right, Ahiru?” Rue looked over at Ahiru’s mostly-full plate with concern. “You’ve barely touched your food, and you really ought to eat more before class starts or you’ll regret it later.”

“I – I’m fine, I just…” Ahiru halfheartedly poked at her porridge with a spoon. “I had a bad dream so I feel kinda funny.”

“Another one?” Rue frowned. “That happened on Monday, too, didn’t it?”

“Um, actually, it’s been happening since Saturday night.” Fakir shot a quick, concerned glance at Ahiru that neither girl noticed. “I don’t know why…”

“Well, maybe it’s left over from whatever you ate that night that disagreed with you.” Rue sipped at her tea. “That can happen sometimes, I think – there’s herbs and spices from certain Series that can cause some strange side effects when people in our world consume them, because we’re not used to them. There’s still much we don’t know about plants from the other related worlds.”

“P-probably.” Ahiru took a bite of her toast and avoided looking at either Rue or Fakir, so as not to give herself away.

“Anyway, it should pass soon enough, so –” Rue broke off as Anne-Erina entered the room. “What is it?” she said, addressing the maid. “Is something wrong?”

“Well, technically, but you might not think so.” Anne-Erina coughed. “I’ve just been asked to inform you that Mr. Katz is feeling ill, so lessons are cancelled for the day. That is all.” She curtsied and left.

“Well!” Rue’s face lit up with a smile. “What an unexpected treat!”

“Not for Mr. Katz, though,” Ahiru said sadly. “Poor Mr. Katz…”

“I wouldn’t worry too much.” Rue waved her hand dismissively. “He’s always a bit under the weather – so to speak – when it rains.”

“Yes, but he doesn’t usually cancel class, so he must be feeling particularly bad,” Fakir pointed out.

Rue rolled her eyes. “Okay, fine, so it’s unfortunate for him, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t enjoy our extra free day, does it? Because I don’t think it does. Now you can relax and finish your breakfast without having to hurry, Ahiru, and you don’t have to stress about class while you’re still feeling weird from your dream.”

Ahiru had to concede that she had a point, and was indeed able to relax a little as she ate, now that there was no time limit. She was thus the last to finish, and got up from the table after Rue and Fakir had already moved to armchairs elsewhere in the room to read. She went back to her room for a book of her own, and settled down in the chair closest to where a fire was crackling softly in the fireplace.

She hadn’t been reading for very long when the door opened. It was Uzura, with Miss Goatette in tow. “The kitty is sick zura?”

“Huh? Oh, Uzura!” Ahiru looked over in surprise at her. “Um, yes, Mr. Katz is sick, so we don’t have class today.”

“Then can I play with you zura?” Uzura trotted into the room before Miss Goatette could catch her. “There’s toys in here zura.”

“Uzura, I’m sure they have other things they’d like to do on their free day,” Miss Goatette said, still a bit out of breath. “I’m sorry, if she’s bothering you, I’ll take her back to her room. When she heard that Mr. Katz was sick, she immediately ran over here…”

“It’s all right!” Ahiru closed her book and set it down. “I’ll play with you, Uzura.”

“Oh, thank you, Miss Ahiru.” Miss Goatette smiled. “I’ll leave her with you, then? I’m going to go visit Mr. Katz and see how he’s feeling, if you don’t mind being left alone with her.”

Ahiru smiled and shook her head. “Not at all!” She walked over to the cupboards where toys were kept and opened them up. “What do you want to play with, Uzura?”

“I don’t know zura.” Uzura stared up at the assortment of toys that she could barely see. “What’s in there zura?”

“Lots of things. I’ll try and find something good. Hmmm…” Ahiru began to sort through the various playthings inside. The toy train she’d spotted last time seemed like a good choice, as did the set of soldiers, and there were some little dolls that could’ve been either fairies or ballerinas, she wasn’t sure which. She chose some wooden animal figures too, and a large toy house, and miraculously only dropped a few things on her way over to a large clear space.

“Lots of stuff zura,” Uzura observed as she sat down near Ahiru. “What are we going to do with them zura?”

“Well…” Ahiru pondered as she set up the toy house where both she and Uzura could see it. “We could say that these fairy ballerinas live in this house, and one day the soldiers come over for a dance.”

“What about the animals zura? Do they dance too zura?”

“Some of them might.” Ahiru picked up a figure of a mouse and examined it. “Which ones do you think would dance?”

“The cat zura.” Uzura took the little wooden cat and placed it with the ballerina figures. “Mr. Katz dances sometimes at Mama’s parties zura.”

“O-oh, really?” Ahiru tried not to laugh. “What other animals do you think would come over and dance?”

“The anteater and the crocodile zura.” Uzura set those as well with the others. “And the duck zura.”

“A duck? Really?” Ahiru frowned down at the carving of the duck that Uzura had put next to the graceful dancers. “You think a duck could dance?”

“You don’t zura?”

“Well… ducks are kind of, um… I never pictured them as being able to dance.” Ahiru shook her head.

“Why not zura?” Uzura tilted her head and stared inquisitively at Ahiru.

“Um, well, I…” Ahiru fidgeted. “I don’t know, I just never did.”

“Well, they do now zura.” Uzura picked up the train. “Are they going to ride on the train zura?”

“Maybe.” Ahiru looked fondly at the toy train. “You know, I came here on a train.”

“What was it like zura?”

“A little scary,” Ahiru admitted as she began to give partners to the fairy ballerina dolls from the assortment of soldiers. “I’d never been on a train before, and nobody went with me to make sure I got on the right one, so I was really worried I’d get on the wrong train and end up somewhere I wasn’t supposed to be, or I’d miss my stop. I was all by myself, so I had to really pay attention and make sure I didn’t do anything wrong or go to the wrong place, but I made it here all right in the end.”

“Are you happy here zura?” Uzura took the cat figure and pretended it was dancing with one of the fairy ballerinas.

“Yes, I am.” Ahiru smiled. “I’m very happy. It’s such a nice place, and – and I really like everyone here.”

“Do you like me zura?”

“Of course!” Ahiru reached over and ruffled Uzura’s hair. “You know I do! We’re friends, remember?”

“That’s right zura.” Uzura set down the cat and the dancer and looked at the remaining animals. “What about the other animals zura?”

“I don’t know.” Ahiru looked thoughtful. “And there’s extra soldiers left too. I don’t know what we should do with them. Put them back, maybe?”

“Or figure out something else to do with them.” Ahiru started in surprise as Fakir sat down next to her. “Maybe the other animals attack the train on the way to the ball, and the other soldiers have to stay behind to fight them. Or the other way around?”

“Fakir! You’re going to play with us zura?” A delighted smile spread across Uzura’s face.

“Yes, if that’s okay.” He darted a glance at Ahiru, who smiled and nodded. He picked up the mouse that Ahiru had been looking at earlier. “Perhaps it’s a plot by the evil mouse king to ruin the party?”

“Yes!” Ahiru picked up one of the soldiers and pretended it was attacking the mouse in Fakir’s hand. “And all the brave knights jump off the train to fight him and his wicked soldiers!”

“Do they win zura?”

“Do you want them to win?” Fakir asked her. “It’s your playtime, you decide.”

“They should win then zura.” Uzura chose an elephant and marched it towards the train. “And then go to the party and dance zura.”

“Then that’s what they’ll do.” Fakir picked up a few soldiers and placed them in the pathway of Uzura’s elephant. “They’ll fight long and hard through the night, and they’ll win just before the sun comes up.”

“And they’ll think they’re too late to join the party, but when they get there, the ball is still going on,” Rue interjected as she sat down next to Uzura. “So they’re just in time to enjoy some dancing before everyone goes home and rests.” She picked up a giraffe and put it next to Uzura’s elephant. “Here, I have an idea, Uzura – we can play the part of the wicked mouse king’s army, and Fakir and Ahiru can be the soldiers who try to fight us off. And then we can each choose who we want to have dance with each other, okay?”

“That sounds good zura.”

A fierce battle ensued then, between Rue and Uzura’s animal soldiers and Fakir and Ahiru’s valiant knights. At the end of the long struggle Ahiru and Fakir’s forces indeed prevailed, with many of Rue and Uzura’s animals surviving and swearing that they’d be back someday. After that, it was time for the ball to take place.

“I want the cat zura,” Uzura said, snatching up the cat figure. “And her zura.” She chose a fairy ballerina with long blonde hair, and proceeded to pretend they were dancing.

“Good choices, Uzura,” Rue praised her. “Hmmm, as for me…” She picked up a dark-haired fairy ballerina. “Oh, I like her. And…” She considered the animals and the soldiers, and went with the figure that had been painted to look like the captain of the battalion. ‘Him.”

“Hmmm…” Ahiru considered the selection before her before picking up the duck. “Since you said they can, Uzura, I’ll choose this duck. And she’ll dance with this knight, I think.” She picked up one of the soldiers and set him beside the duck.

“A duck, huh?” Fakir glanced over at her before returning his attention to the toys.

Ahiru blushed. “It was Uzura’s idea. She said ducks could dance.”

“I heard her before.” Fakir selected a little fairy ballerina with red hair and set her next to one of the soldiers. “There. Now they can all dance together before going home to sleep. I imagine everyone’s tired after all the fighting and dancing.”

“But they had fun zura.” Uzura nodded as she made her chosen couple dance across the floor, nearly knocking over those of the other three. “It was a good party zura.”

“Yes, it was.” Rue smiled and picked up her couple. “Look, Uzura, I think your cat wants to dance with my ballerina.”

“Even though he already has a date zura?” Uzura frowned. “What a greedy kitty zura.”

“Well, he really really wants to get married, so he’s not picky.” Rue giggled. “Do you think he would fight the soldier?”

“Yes zura. But he would run away when his tail got stepped on zura.”

Rue laughed again. “That sounds about right.”

They played out the rest of the ball until Uzura got bored, and then created another scenario involving animals and ballerinas and a haunted house. They had just finished that one when Anne-Erina came back in to serve them lunch, seeming unsurprised by Uzura’s presence there. Lunch was sandwiches and hot soup, with a pot of tea for the older three and some milk for Uzura. Even dessert was included that day, a plate of cookies that they all devoured (though Uzura was allowed to have the last one).

“What are we going to play now zura?” Uzura asked as she bounded out of her chair, sending cookie crumbs flying everywhere as she did.

“Nothing.” Fakir moved quickly to her side and scooped her up in his arms. “It’s time for your nap.”

“But I don’t want to nap zura!” Uzura squirmed in his grasp. “I want to keep playing zura! And take a walk zura!”

“Silly, we can’t walk in the rain!” Ahiru laughed as she too got up. “But we’ll play more later, I promise. You have to be a good girl and take your nap, okay? Just like the knights and the animals and the ballerinas had to rest after their party.”

“But it’s no fun zura.” Uzura pouted as Fakir carried her towards the door. Ahiru rushed over so that she could open the door for him, and followed him out as he headed to Uzura’s room. “I want to play now zura.”

“It’s either a nap now, or you go to bed early tonight without a story,” Fakir said. “Which would you rather do?”

“A nap zura!” Uzura answered so quickly that Ahiru giggled. “You promised you’d read me a story tonight zura!”

“Well, you have to be good and take your nap, or I’ll have to postpone it till tomorrow night.”

“Okay zura.” Uzura slumped down in defeat. “I’ll nap zura.”

“Good.” Fakir waited for Ahiru to open Uzura’s bedroom door, and then proceeded inside. He drew back the covers of her bed with one hand, and then laid her down gently. He placed a small stuffed animal in her waiting arms before pulling the covers over her and tucking her in. “Now, you better stay in here until Miss Goatette comes in and tells you it’s time to get up.”

“I will zura.” She hugged the stuffed animal – which Ahiru noticed now was a little yellow duckling – and closed her eyes. “Bye bye zura.”

“Bye.” Fakir ushered Ahiru out, and quietly closed the door behind the both of them.

“Does she always say that when she takes a nap?” Ahiru asked.

Fakir nodded. “Yes. I don’t know why, but she does. She refuses to say “goodnight” because she knows it’s daytime.”

“That’s cute.” Ahiru smiled fondly. “And she has a little duck, no wonder she wanted that to be one of the dancing animals.”

“It used to be mine, actually,” Fakir admitted as he started walking away. “She found it in my room and she liked it so much that I let her keep it.”

“What?” Ahiru gaped at his back as she followed him. “Really?”

“Yeah.” He looked back at her. “Chrestomanci bought it for me not long after I came here. She’d heard from Karon – who was friends with my parents – that I liked ducks, so she took me down to the duck pond one day to try and cheer me up. But I was a stupid child still, and I tried to pick up one of the ducklings.” He rubbed his arm idly. “I’m sure you can imagine what the mother duck thought of that.”

“Oh no!” Ahiru’s hand flew up to her mouth. “You – she attacked you?”

He nodded. “Not too badly, just pecked a bit before I let go of the duckling. I was so upset, though, that Chrestomanci went straight down to the village herself right afterwards and bought that toy for me. She felt it was safer for me to have that to play with instead of trying to pick up any more live ducklings.”

“That was really nice of her.” Ahiru smiled. “I like ducks too, even though I always got teased at the orphanage.”

“Teased? For liking ducks?”

“Um, well, s-sorta, but mostly… mostly for being…” Ahiru’s smile faded and she stared down at her feet. “For being like one. I’m sure you’ve noticed, but my voice sounds like a duck’s, or at least that’s what everybody said, and when I’m startled about something, I make this noise that – that sounds kind of like a quack.” Her face got hot with embarrassment. “So, so they would always try to scare me so that I’d quack and then they’d laugh at me.”

Fakir thought back to the day he’d gone looking for her in the gardens, and how he’d thought he’d heard a quack when he’d begun telling her about the reason for his reaction to the fire. This explained it. “I’m sorry. I… didn’t mean to bring up bad memories.” He scowled. “No wonder you’re happier here – they were cruel to you there.”

“I really do sound like a duck, though,” Ahiru said in a low voice.

“So? What’s wrong with that? It doesn’t give them the right to treat you badly. There’s something wrong with them for doing that, not you. It’s not your fault.”

“I – I know.” Ahiru swallowed past the sudden lump in her throat. “I just… I just… wish I had a different voice so they didn’t do that.”

“Idiot. Nothing’s wrong with your voice, they’re the ones with the problem. I already told you that.” Fakir shook his head. “You shouldn’t blame yourself for other people choosing to be terrible. Anyway, I’m going to the library to get something before I go back.”

“Okay,” Ahiru said brightly, and continued to follow him. Fakir got a puzzled look on his face that became one of faint amusement, and then he simply shrugged. He wasn’t sure why she’d want to go to the library with him when she’d just gone on Sunday to get a giant new stack of books (one that he’d helped her carry back to her room when he came across her struggling with them in the hall), but he didn’t care to ask and make her feel unwelcome, so he said nothing.

She continued to walk with him as he headed into the section of the library that he needed, and browsed the books while standing beside him. “What are you looking for?” she asked. She wasn’t good at whispering, and hadn’t seemed to notice.

“I want to review what I know about dragon’s blood.” Fakir replaced one of the books on the shelf and laid his hand on the spell plate to switch the selection to one from a Series Eight world. “Maybe we can figure out how it was you came in contact with it before Saturday night.”

“I don’t remember, though, and I’m not even sure I really did. How would a book help?”

“If you look at the types of spells that use it, it could trigger your memory somehow. Don’t give up before you’ve even tried.” Fakir removed a book about dragons from the shelf. “I told you, if you think you smelled it before, you most likely did. You really need to start trusting your own instincts more, that’s important for anyone with magic, but especially you.”

“Y-yeah, I know…” Ahiru peered at a book titled What We Can Learn From Dragons. “I try to… it’s just all so new to me still, so I have a hard time. And my magic still isn’t really reliable so it’s hard to trust it.”

“That’ll change with enough effort and practice, so just keep working hard like you have been.” Fakir frowned and touched the spell plate again so that he could look at books from a different Series Eight world.

Ahiru opened her mouth to reply, but just then, they heard the door to the library open and a familiar voice spoke. “How is he feeling, then?” It was Chrestomanci.

“He’s doing a little better, I think.” Miss Goatette sighed. “Still convinced someone broke into his workshop on Saturday, though, despite there being no evidence of anything missing, and no matter how many times I tell him that the castle security spells never went off even once.”

“What makes him think someone was in there?”

“Oh, you know how he is.” She sighed again. “The slightest thing out of place or not in the exact position he thinks he left it in, and he’s convinced someone’s been meddling or snooping. He’ll let go of it in time, I’m sure, but until then he’s so fixated on it.”

“Mmmm. The mind can be a one-way road if one is determined to follow such a path.” Chrestomanci sighed too. “A pity he fell ill today of all days.”

“It can’t be helped.” Miss Goatette sounded apologetic. “You know how he is on rainy days.”

“Indeed. I do hope he recovers soon, I have need of him. I’ve finally uncovered some new information, you see, and he could discreetly put me in contact with family members and acquaintances of his that might be able to shed some light on it.”

“Oh? That’s good, then.”

“Yes. I –”

This didn’t seem like something they should be eavesdropping on, so Fakir slipped his arm around Ahiru’s shoulders and quietly led her away through a few rows of shelves, in a roundabout way that took them eventually to the door. She stumbled a few times, but he held her steady until they got out of the library, where he finally let go. Only when they were far enough away that presumably no one within could hear them did Ahiru finally speak. “Do you – do you think Mr. Katz suspects us?”

“No.” Fakir shook his head. “If he did, he would’ve already confronted us about it.”

“Oh.” Ahiru twisted her hands. “That’s good, cause I don’t know if I could keep it a secret if he asked, I’m really bad at lying…” She glanced at the single book Fakir was carrying. “Oh! You only got one book from there, is that okay? I know you weren’t finished looking, is it really okay to leave?”

Fakir shrugged. “I can always go back another time. Don’t worry about it.”

“Okay. And, um, thanks for trying to help me figure this out.” Ahiru blushed and looked at the floor. “I really appreciate it.”

“It – it’s nothing.” Fakir looked away too. “I don’t even know if it’ll do anything, it might be a long shot. I haven’t actually helped you yet; this might be useless.”

“Even if it is, I’m still happy you’re trying.” Ahiru smiled. “That’s enough for me.”

“It’s not a big deal, I’m as curious about the stuff as you are.” He was trying his very best to sound as casual and neutral as possible, and hoped it was working. “Just don’t get your hopes up for the results.”

“Okay, I won’t. But, but don’t worry about disappointing me even if we don’t find anything, cause like I said, I’m just happy you’re trying.”

“Hmph.”

They went back to the playroom then, where Rue was dozing in an armchair next to a window that the rain was still slithering down. They were very quiet as they settled themselves in chairs of their own, and so Rue didn’t wake up until Uzura arrived with her drum. The rest of the afternoon was thus spent playing with her, until it was time to get ready for dinner.


	14. Chapter 14

Mr. Katz returned to class on Friday morning despite that it rained again, looking droopy and tired. To Ahiru and Fakir’s deep relief, he never once accused them of having been in his workshop or acted like he suspected them of anything. Still, they were unable to fully relax about the matter until Monday, because Sunday evening was the first time he hadn’t brought up the subject at dinner. As Miss Goatette had predicted, he seemed to have finally let go of his obsession with it, though that didn’t make them any less careful in their interactions with him lest he become suspicious.

On Wednesday it threatened to rain again, but as all of them had things they needed or simply really, really wanted in town, they took their umbrellas with them. Ahiru noticed that Fakir’s was a somewhat shabby black one that he’d clearly had for some time, while Rue was sporting a brand new red one that was still in its protective packaging. She didn’t notice, though, that Fakir briefly smiled to himself when he saw her duck umbrella.

They all walked down together, but separated once inside the village. Ahiru went first to the little bookstore she’d passed by a few times, and browsed for a while. It was tempting to buy one of the shiny new books that caught her eye, but she couldn’t help but feel guilty about the mere idea of spending her precious pocket money on books when there was such a vast selection in the library at home. So instead she purchased a few new bookmarks, one each for herself, Fakir, and Rue, and a little notebook for doodling in.

She headed towards the sweet shop next and was almost there when she was seized on both sides and dragged away in the direction of the creepy little witchcraft supply store that she always hurried past. “Waaaaah!” She turned her head from side to side, and saw that her abductors were none other than the girls who always followed Fakir around and watched him while he shopped. “Wha – what are you doing? Let go of me!”

They ignored her. “Into this shop, you think?” the purple-haired one asked her companion. “I’ll get the door.”

“Yes, perfect!” The blonde giggled. “It has just the right ominous atmosphere for an interrogation! She’ll be so terrified that she’ll answer all our questions right away!”

“I’m surprised you don’t want to torture the information out of her, Lilie,” she remarked dryly as she opened the door with one hand and pulled Ahiru through. The bell over the door rang with a mournful sound.

“Oh, Pike, I was just getting to that!” Lilie giggled again. “A store like this will surely have the right tools on hand if that becomes a necessity, so it’s even more perfect!”

“I – interrogation?” Ahiru’s eyes widened with horror and she struggled to get free, even as Lilie closed the shop door behind the three of them. “Wh-wh-what? What? What are you doing, I, I, I, I don’t know anything!”

“No point in lying.” Pike released her arm and leaned in close. She was about the same size as Ahiru, but had a somewhat intimidating air about her now. “You know all about him.”

“Him?” Ahiru blinked. “Him who? What?”

“Oh, she’s so clueless and scatterbrained! How cute!” Lilie squealed. “Shall I forcibly remind her of whom we speak?”

“No need, we don’t want to escalate things THAT quickly.” Pike rolled her eyes before returning her attention to Ahiru. “I’ll get to the point. We’ve seen you in town before, hanging around the wonderful Fakir – don’t bother denying it! You’re clearly from the castle, where we know he lives, and you two are clearly VERY close. So obviously you do know things about him.”

“O-oh, s-so this is about Fakir?” Ahiru gulped nervously, and a blush spread across her face. “W-well, um, okay, y-yeah, I do live in the castle, and I do know him, but, but, not that well, not really.” She knew it wasn’t the best lie, not even for her, but she had to stall for time while she thought of a way to get out of this and get out of here. She knew Fakir wouldn’t want her to tell them anything about him, so she was determined to reveal as little as possible before she figured out how to make her exit.

“She’s lying!” Lilie exclaimed, looking excited. “We should punish her!”

“In a bit. First I want to hear what she DOES know, and then we’ll figure out if there’s anything else beyond that that she doesn’t want us to know she knows.” Pike advanced further on Ahiru, making her back up further into the shop. She bumped into a table, and shuddered when she braced herself against the edge and her hand touched something squishy and moist there. The lighting in here was even worse on such a dark, overcast day, so she couldn’t tell what it was. “To start with, we’ve seen you both shopping at that candy store. What’s his favorite kind?”

“I – I don’t know,” Ahiru lied as she slid around the edge of the table to get away from Pike. “He – he – buys different stuff and doesn’t talk about what his favorites are.” She knew full well that he favored the chocolate covered marzipan above everything else, even the black licorice, but wasn’t about to tell them that.

“Then tell us what kind of stuff he buys!” Pike planted her hands on her hips. “Lilie, make a list!”

“Right!” She pulled a pad of paper and a pen out of her gaudy, sequined handbag.

“I – I don’t remember what he bought last time,” Ahiru said desperately. The smell in here was starting to bother her; she couldn’t pick out any individual odors, but there was something in the pungent mix that offended her and made her stomach churn a little.

“I don’t believe you.” Pike shook her head. “You went in there with him and you picked out all your candy together – as far as we could see through the window – and you left together, and I refuse to believe you two didn’t share your candy afterwards.”

“It – it wasn’t a date or anything like that!” Ahiru blurted out, her face going even redder. “We just wanted to – to…” She trailed off, both from a desire to keep herself from revealing too much and from internal confusion as to why she’d said that.

Pike and Lilie exchanged significant glances at this. “An interesting choice of denial, don’t you think, Lilie? Especially since we never said the word ‘date’!”

“Oh yes, Pike, indeed.” Lilie giggled. “Very telling that her mind went right to that conclusion! They must be even closer than we thought!

“What?! N-no, no, we’re, we’re really not!” Ahiru shook her head frantically. “Th-that’s just what you made it s-sound like, that’s why I said that! We’re really not like that! Not at all!”

“Definitely lying,” Lilie said happily. “We need to coerce the information out of her. Once we know how she won his heart, we can use her secrets to steal him away from her. But of course first we’ll have a glorious battle, and she can fall in the mud and get sent back to him looking like such a mess, and it’ll ruin their whole day, and it’ll be beautifully tragic!”

“I agree.” Pike began to look around the shop for the right tools for the job, while Ahiru tried to use the distraction to sneak past her. “Let’s see, what would be best…”

“You’ll have to pay for anything you want first.” All three jumped as an old man appeared right behind Ahiru, seemingly from nowhere at all. He was short and squat, with a toad-like face, and was obviously keeping his white hair long in a feeble attempt to compensate for the fact that he was bald on top, right down to the tops of his ears. “I don’t offer free samples and I don’t approve of thievery, young lady.”

“Of – of course we were intending to pay!” Pike recovered first. “We’re – we’re not those kinds of girls, you know! How rude to treat your customers like this!”

“You’re not a customer until you buy something.” He smiled unkindly. “Now then, if you don’t –” He broke off as he spotted Ahiru, and his unpleasantly large eyes widened in recognition. “Oh, it’s –” He seemed to catch himself, and went into a brief coughing fit. “Excuse me. I’m sorry. Now, as I was going to say… that is a rare piece of jewelry you have on, young lady. Mind if I take a look at it?”

He reached for the pendant, but Ahiru backed away, clutching her umbrella and shopping bag to herself. She collided with another table, and the impact sent a glass jar perched precariously on the edge crashing to the floor, spilling orange powder everywhere. “Ahhhh! I’m sorry!”

“It’s of no consequence.” He smiled and walked forward. “Now then, that necklace… how would you like to make some extra pocket money by selling it to me? I can offer you a price you won’t get anywhere else.”

“It – it’s not for sale!” Ahiru kept backing away, and nearly slipped and fell when she trod on the powder. She didn’t like the slimy, calculating look in his eyes at all.

“Are you sure? I’m willing to pay you a hefty sum, young lady. More, I’m sure, than the people at the castle give you in at least a few months. You can buy a lot of sweets and pretty things with that kind of money.” He kept advancing, and kept smiling his oily smile. “Just think about it, won’t you?”

“Do you mind?” Pike interjected. “We’re in the middle of an interrogation here, and you’re interrupting! Leave her alone about the necklace! Hey!” she exclaimed as he pushed past her, ignoring her completely. “This is terrible customer service, you know!”

The old man sighed and turned towards her. “Didn’t I already explain that you’re not customers until you buy something? You are the one interrupting my transaction.”

“Fine, I’ll buy this!” Pike grabbed the first thing she saw off the nearest table, which turned out to be a package of eel spleens. “And then –”

“Pike, she’s getting away!” Lilie wailed.

“What?!” Both Pike and the old man whipped their heads around as the bell above the door clanged mournfully again. “No!”

Ahiru ran. She could hear them shouting behind her, and she hoped they wouldn’t pursue her. She was thankful to that girl for distracting the old man, in spite of the fact that she was the reason she had been in the awful shop to begin with. A few raindrops were starting to fall on her head, but she barely noticed them, and kept running.

She didn’t stop running until she was forced to a halt by colliding with someone coming out of a shop, and would’ve fallen down when her feet slipped on the wet cobblestones as she stumbled backwards if a pair of strong hands hadn’t gripped her shoulders and held her steady. “Hey, be careful.” It was Fakir. “Don’t run around carelessly, idiot, especially when it’s starting to rain.”

“F-Fakir…” Ahiru was always glad to see him, but perhaps now more than ever. “I – I… I’m sorry…”

“Ahiru?” His annoyed expression instantly faded into one of worry as she looked up at him. “What’s wrong? What happened?”

“I… it… they… I…” She swallowed. “It’s hard to say, really…”

Fakir frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I… well…” Ahiru shivered. “It – it’s… it was…”

“Ahiru?” Rue had emerged from one of the nearby shops and was hurrying over with a concerned look on her face. “Is everything all right? You look shaken, did something happen?”

“S-sort of, I, I…” Ahiru shivered again. “Can – can we go inside? It’s cold out here and I don’t want to be found if they look for me.”

“They? Is someone after you?” Fakir moved to stand behind Ahiru and scanned the street, even though he had no idea who he was looking for. “What’s going on?”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, we can find out after we get her inside somewhere like she asked.” Rue rolled her eyes. “I could use some hot tea myself, so let’s go do that.” She put her arm around Ahiru’s shoulders and led her away. “Come on, both of you.”

They walked off then, Fakir close behind them. He kept looking back over his shoulder to see if anyone was following them, but there was nobody there. Rue led Ahiru to a small café, and held the door open for her so she could go in first. They found a little table close to where a fire was crackling in the fireplace, and Rue ordered tea for all of them. Ahiru was still shivering, but the warmth of the fire helped, and she entertained herself by looking through the menu while they waited for the tea.

“All right. So what happened?” Fakir brushed some of his damp hair out of his face and leaned across the table. “You looked pretty upset, and you mentioned someone looking for you?”

“W-well, I…” Ahiru gulped. “It – it started when those girls snuck up on me and grabbed me on the way to the candy store…”

“Girls? What girls?”

“Y-you know. The – the ones that really like you and follow you around.” Ahiru blushed and looked down. “They pulled me into that creepy shop near the candy store and – and they said they were interrogating me and, and that they were going to torture me cause they had seen me with you and they wanted to know all about you.”

“I see.” Fakir scowled. “They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

“N-no!” Ahiru shook her head. “I – I’m fine, they only threatened to do stuff. And I didn’t tell them anything about you, I swear! I lied and told them I barely knew you, but they didn’t believe me, and – and even if they hadn’t gotten interrupted, I wouldn’t have said a thing, I know you wouldn’t want me to…”

“Hmph. What interrupted them?”

“Um, the – the shopkeeper.” Ahiru felt queasy just thinking about him again. “He told them they couldn’t use anything in the store unless they paid for it first, and they got mad at him, and then he saw me, and… and this was really really weird! He looked at me like he knew me! But I’d never seen him before!”

“What?” Rue frowned. “But how would he know you if you only came to live here recently? And that shop’s been there for decades, I think.”

“I don’t know! That’s why I said it was weird!” Ahiru shuddered. “And, and then, he wanted to buy my pendant and he was really insistent about it and wanted to pay me a lot of money. It was creepy.” She made a face. “An-and when I tried to get away, I bumped into a table and it knocked over this jar and it broke and there was powder everywhere on the floor, and I said I was sorry but he said it didn’t matter and that’s weird too, right? Cause he was so rude to those other girls and practically accusing them of being thieves and saying they weren’t customers till they bought something, so why wouldn’t he care that I broke something? I didn’t like him at all.”

“That is pretty strange.” Rue’s frown deepened. “I mean, your pendant is lovely and all, but why would an old man who runs a shop like that want it? And why be so insistent about it? Unless he really wanted a gift for a granddaughter or something…”

“I don’t think that was it.” Ahiru shook her head. “He – he didn’t act like that was it, he… I don’t know, I didn’t like him. He was scary.”

“Well, I’m just glad you’re all right.” Rue sighed. “I’m sorry, Ahiru. That sounds awful – first those girls threatening you, and then that… what a terrible morning you’ve had!”

“It wasn’t so bad before then, though.” Ahiru brightened. “I almost forgot! I got you both something!” She opened up the little bag from the bookstore and rummaged around in it. “Here!” She proudly presented the bookmarks to both of them. Rue’s had a watercolor painting of a dark-haired ballerina on it, while the one she’d chosen for Fakir depicted a duck swimming on a pond.

“Oh, Ahiru, how pretty!” Rue smiled. “You’re so sweet! Thank you!”

“Y-yeah… thanks…” Fakir turned a little red as he stared down at the bookmark. “You – you really didn’t have to, though…”

“I know. But I wanted to!” Ahiru blushed a little too. “Y-you two are always doing such nice things for me, and – and when I saw these I thought of you, so I decided to buy them for you.”

“Oh, Ahiru, we don’t do things for you because we want you to pay us back.” Rue shook her head. “Not that your gift isn’t appreciated, but I want you to understand that you shouldn’t feel like you have to do things like this, okay?”

“Oh, I – I know.” Ahiru turned even redder and stared down at the table. “I just… I just wanted to get you both something cause I thought you’d like it.”

“We know.” Rue took her hand and squeezed it. “Thank you. Also…” She glanced at the café’s front windows, and seemed relieved to see that nobody was standing outside them. “I think it’d be best if, at least for a while, you didn’t walk around here alone anymore. I don’t want you getting cornered by those girls or that shopkeeper again, so you should stick close to me or Fakir while you’re here.”

Ahiru looked back and forth between the two of them. “Is – is that really all right? I mean, I don’t want to bother you two…”

“Don’t be stupid, the real bother would be if you were to get into some kind of trouble again.” Fakir folded his arms. “You don’t want to have them try to drag you off for more of that kind of treatment, do you? Then stay close to us.”

“He’s right. Those girls especially won’t go near you if you’re with him.” Rue giggled. “They’re so afraid to approach him that they run across the street when he leaves a place, remember?” Fakir scowled.

“Have they ever tried to do that to you?” Ahiru asked. “I mean, you’ve been living here a lot longer and they would’ve seen you talking to Fakir in town too, and they knew he and I both live at the castle, so why haven’t they tried asking you for information about him too?”

“They haven’t, no. Huh.” Rue looked thoughtful. “That’s a good question.”

“Does it really matter? They shouldn’t be doing that to either of you.” It was Fakir’s turn to roll his eyes. “They need to mind their own business and leave all of us alone. Even if they did get any information out of Ahiru, it wouldn’t do them any good because I don’t want anything to do with them. Especially after this.”

“Well, I can’t say I blame you. Oh, here’s our tea. Finally.” Rue waited until they’d been served and had sampled some of her tea before speaking again. “Ah, that does the trick. Anyway, I know you don’t want anything to do with them and I don’t blame you, but I do think it’s odd that they picked Ahiru to question and not me. It doesn’t make much sense.”

“Does it have to?” Fakir sighed with annoyance. “Again, I don’t see why it matters.”

“I guess it doesn’t. But it’s going to bug me anyway.”

“Distract yourself somehow, then.” Fakir took a sip of his tea.

Rue glared at him. “This? Is exactly why I don’t understand their obsession with you to begin with. Clearly they don’t know anything about your actual personality, which I suppose is why they decided to kidnap Ahiru. If they did, they’d never want anything to do with you, unless they’re so immature they like this sort of thing.”

“Rue, that’s terrible, don’t say that!” Ahiru protested, looking upset. “Fakir might seem grumpy sometimes and I know you don’t get along but he’s actually really really sweet and –”

“Ahiru, it’s fine,” Fakir interrupted, his face slightly red. “It’s nothing I haven’t heard from her before.”

“It was really mean, though!” She seemed almost on the verge of tears. “I – I’m sorry to yell at you, Rue, but, but you shouldn’t say things like that! It can really hurt people’s feelings!”

“But it’s –”

“No, Ahiru’s right,” Rue interrupted, looking uncomfortable. “I’m sorry, Fakir. I shouldn’t have gone that far. I really didn’t mean it. I’m sorry.”

“I know. It’s fine,” Fakir repeated as he looked away, his face unreadable again. “A-anyway, as I’ve said before, I don’t understand them either, and I think this is devoting more thought to them than they deserve.”

“I suppose you’ve got a point there,” Rue conceded. She turned to Ahiru. “And – I’m sorry, please don’t feel bad for yelling, you were right to. I’m sorry I upset you on top of what already happened to you today. I’m a very thoughtless person sometimes.”

“It –it’s okay,” Ahiru mumbled, sinking down into her seat. “Um, can we just talk about something else? I don’t want to think about any of it anymore.”

Rue nodded. “Of course.”

They ended up staying there for another couple of hours, eventually ordering more tea and some lunch for themselves, talking about anything and everything aside from what had happened that morning. It hung like a specter at the back of Ahiru’s mind, though, and she was unable to fully relax until she was safely back at the castle.


	15. Chapter 15

Thursday morning dawned cool and clear, the storm having passed during the night. Ahiru awoke feeling like she had, for once, had a pleasant dream, though she couldn’t recall the details and only had a vague, shadowy impression left in her mind. Had Fakir been in it? She blushed at the idea as she washed up in the bath.

“You seem to be feeling better today,” Rue observed as they ate lunch after a morning spent in lessons with a Mr. Katz who also seemed to be feeling more like himself, which unfortunately included the tendency to pounce on the slightest error. Luckily, Ahiru had managed to slip under his radar that day, her good night of sleep improving her mood and concentration. “You’ve recovered from yesterday, then?”

Ahiru nodded. “And I didn’t have any bad dreams last night, either!”

“Even better.” Rue smiled. “I’m glad you’re feeling well, I was worried about you after what you went through yesterday. And I’m sure Fakir was too, even though he doesn’t show it.” She nudged his foot under the table, and he raised his eyebrows at her in a look of utter disdain.

“O-oh, um, you, you didn’t really need to be.” Ahiru shook her head. “It’s no big deal, I’m fine now. I feel much better being back here, I feel safe here.”

“So you’re not worrying unnecessarily about being sent away anymore?” Fakir asked.

“Nope!” Ahiru smiled at him. “I know now that that’s not going to happen, and I’m so glad. I love it here. It’s – it’s home to me.” She swallowed, her eyes a bit shinier than usual. “I’ve never really thought of anywhere else as home before…”

“That’s wonderful. I mean, that you consider it home here and you’re not worried anymore about leaving,” Rue hastily amended. “Nobody here wants you to leave any more than you want to go, and I’m glad you’re happy.”

“I really am.” Ahiru finished the last of her tea and set the cup down. “It’s the best place I’ve ever been.”

“It doesn’t seem like you have much to compare it to, but I do agree that it’s lovely here.” Rue frowned at a curl that had come loose from her updo and shoved it behind her ear.

“Well, the orphanage wasn’t that nice, no…” Ahiru stared off into space, thinking. “My uncle’s house was kinda big, I think, but it was awfully cold and kinda empty, it felt like… I mean, he had stuff in it, but there was nobody else there but the two of us so I got lonely and it was scary in there cause it always seemed dark, even on sunny days, so I didn’t really like going exploring or anything and there were lots of rooms he didn’t want me going in or I’d get in trouble. It wasn’t warm and interesting and fun like it is in this castle.”

“Your uncle was rich?” Fakir set down his cup too.

“I guess.” Ahiru shrugged. “He made a lot of money doing whatever it was he did as a warlock, I think. He didn’t want me poking my nose in where it didn’t belong, he said, so I don’t really know much about his work. I was kind of left alone a lot.” She sighed. “That’s one of the things I like so much about being here, I don’t have to be alone all the time. I have you, and Rue, and Uzura, and I don’t feel lonely anymore.”

“I’m glad you’re not lonely.” Rue reached over and squeezed her hand. “I think we better get back in the classroom now, though, or we’ll all have Mr. Katz angry at us for being late.”

“Oh!” Ahiru stood up so quickly that she jostled the table, rattling the china and silverware. “Y-you’re right! Oh, oops, oh no, nothing broke, did it?”

“Calm down.” Fakir stood up too. “It’s fine.”

“Oh, good, okay.” Ahiru hurried off towards the door to the classroom, Fakir and Rue following close behind.

Mr. Katz was seated at his desk as they entered. He gave them all stern looks as they entered and Ahiru shrank back a little from his gaze, but he otherwise said nothing and simply rose from his seat. He cleared his throat significantly as they all sat back down at their desks. “I’ve been asked by Chrestomanci to give you all special instructions today on a particular form of magic she thinks you two older students need refreshing on and that you, Miss Ahiru, need to be introduced to.” He swiveled in place and fixed his eyes on Fakir. “Mr. Fakir, please tell the rest of the class what Performative Speech is, if you haven’t forgotten by now.”

Fakir barely resisted the almost reflexive urge to roll his eyes at this, knowing it would only get him in unnecessary trouble. “Performative Speech is a form of enchanter’s magic where you say things in such a way that what you’re saying happens as you say it.”

“Correct, if not thorough.” Mr. Katz then launched into a more in-depth explanation of how it worked and why and what caused it to. It made Ahiru’s head spin more than a little, but she figured that since she understood the basic idea Fakir had explained, she would probably be able to get the hang of it with a little practice. She hoped, anyway.

“Now then, since you all presumably understand it, you will practice it on your own.” Mr. Katz walked over to his desk and retrieved three objects. He laid one down on each of their desks: a rubber duck on Fakir’s desk, a pair of ballet shoes on Rue’s, and a small puppet on Ahiru’s. “Mr. Fakir, you will make this toy behave as though it is a real live duck. Miss Rue, I want you to cause these shoes to dance on their own. And Miss Ahiru, make this puppet move about.”

Ahiru stared down at the puppet. It was a flat, jointed thing made of cardboard, painted to look like it was wearing some kind of jester’s outfit. There was something about its face that creeped her out, though she wasn’t sure what. All she knew was that she didn’t like it and wished she’d been handed something else. “A-all right.”

The classroom air then became a tangle of three voices as they each set to the task assigned them. Ahiru forced herself to concentrate on getting her own magic to work, rather than getting distracted by listening to Fakir as he spoke softly to the toy duck. He soon had it flapping tiny wings, while Rue managed to get her shoes to stand up on her desk as though a dancer had gone en pointe in them, and they were taking tentative steps across the wooden surface. Ahiru, meanwhile, could only seem to get the puppet to feebly twitch about a bit before lying back down.

A twinge of panic rose up in Ahiru’s stomach as the lesson went on and she made no more progress while the other two continued to make little steps forward, the toy duck quacking and blinking and the shoes dancing haltingly. There was something uncomfortably familiar about this scenario. Scowling in concentration, she shut her ears to what the other two were saying, and directed all her attention to the puppet that wiggled its paper limbs at her.

“I need you to stand up for me now.” She tried to make her voice sound stern, but it quavered a little with the desperation she was feeling. Yet, despite that, the puppet obeyed her, swaying only slightly as it rose to its feet and stood up. Ahiru gasped in surprise, but made herself stay focused. “A-and now you should turn around and wave at Fakir.” The puppet obediently turned in the direction of Fakir, who had conjured a piece of bread from the kitchens and was feeding it to the duck. It waved one of its arms at him. Excitement bubbled up inside her. “Now do the same to Rue.” It pivoted around and waved at Rue, who by now had set the shoes to dancing more smoothly on her desk.

Ahiru clapped a hand over her mouth in excitement. It was working! Something she was using magic to do was actually working. This was still so new to her that she hadn’t completely gotten used to it yet. While the puppet stood waiting for more instructions, she scanned the room for something else she could make it interact with. Her eyes fell upon the dusty old grandfather clock in the corner that for some reason was stopped and hadn’t been fixed. She nodded. Perfect. “N-now, hop down off my desk and go over to the clock, and o-open it up and go inside.” Please please please, she thought to herself. I really want to do a good job with this!

The puppet jumped off her desk, but fell flat on its face and lay there twitching. It took a couple tries before Ahiru had it up and walking again, its steps a bit wobbly and wandering, but steady. It made it over to the clock, and after some struggling, opened up the front and sat itself down inside.

“Excellent, Miss Ahiru!” She started in surprise – she’d never heard Mr. Katz sound that pleased with her before. “You have outdone yourself today! Full marks, and I shall be relaying the good news to Chrestomanci. She was very interested in how you’d do on your first try at this magic. I believe she’ll be impressed.”

Ahiru squirmed in embarrassment. “O-oh, that’s – that’s good to know, I – I’m glad…”

Mr. Katz’s mustache twitched. “As you should be.” He looked over at what Rue and Fakir had done with their assigned objects. “You all have performed this most satisfactorily, so set down your work. Full marks for all of you. You are dismissed until tomorrow.”

The relief was palpable from all three of them as Ahiru retrieved the puppet, Rue had the shoes set themselves down and remain still, and Fakir returned the rubber duck to being an inanimate toy. They deposited the items back on Mr. Katz’ desk before they walked out, heading back to their rooms to unwind or get something.

“Ahiru?”

Fakir’s voice caught her attention as she walked past him on the way to her room. She turned back to look at him. “What?”

“You… you did very well. Earlier.” He swallowed. “You should be proud of yourself.”

A rush of warmth flooded through her at his words. “Th-thank you!” She clasped her hands together and beamed at him. “I – I still don’t really understand everything Mr. Katz said about it and why it works and everything,” she admitted, “but I got the idea well enough cause of what you said, and – and so I was somehow able to make it work anyway, and I’m really really happy about it!”

“I’m… glad I could help.” Fakir turned away so that he could open his door and use it to hide the blush spreading across his face. “I – I’ll see you at dinner, then; do you want to study some more afterwards?”

“Of course!” Ahiru nodded. “I still need practice on some stuff, and… and…” She felt her face grow hot, and her heart started to beat faster in anticipation of what she was about to say. “I – I meant what I said yesterday, or – or what I was trying to say, anyway. I – I really – I – I like spending time with you, and – and I don’t think you’re unlikable or anything like that, not at all, so… so please don’t take what Rue said to heart, I know she didn’t really mean it, but stuff like that can still hurt, I know that. So please don’t let it bother you, okay?”

“It doesn’t.” It was a miracle that he was able to keep his voice as neutral as he did. “But… thank you anyway.” He turned to look at her again, and she couldn’t quite tell what the look in his eyes was. “I’ll see you later, Ahiru.”

“Y-yeah!” Ahiru smiled at him, and turned to go into her own room once he’d shut the door.

Once alone in her room, she sat on her bed and waited for her heart to slow down while she caught her breath. She wasn’t entirely sure why she was so nervous, but regardless, it took several minutes for her to feel calmer. She picked up her latest book from her bedside table and tried to read, but found it hard to concentrate, and eventually put it down and walked over to the window seat. She watched Rue and Uzura walk out over the grounds until they disappeared into the trees, and then returned to her bed to lie down.

She somehow managed to doze off, albeit in fits and starts, and didn’t awake fully until the gong rang to warn her that she only had half an hour till dinner. She sprang up and rushed to the bathroom to fix her hair and then changed into a nicer dress before hurrying downstairs.

Ahiru was the last to arrive as usual, despite that she’d tried to hurry. She scanned the room as she entered, and her eyes lit up as she spotted Fakir, who was already sitting at the table by himself and staring out the window. He looked lost in thought about something and didn’t see her walk in. Butterflies fluttered in her stomach as she headed over to him; he was always handsome, but something about the expression on his face now somehow made him seem even more so.

He immediately noticed when she sat down in the chair next to him, though, and snapped out of his reverie. “Oh… Ahiru.”

“Hi, Fakir.” Ahiru smiled, and shifted in her chair so she could face him. “Y-you looked like you were thinking about something. Was it about class?”

“No, just…” He shook his head. “Nothing in particular.” He turned in his seat so that he could face her too. “Listen, about yesterday… I thought about it earlier, and I think you should tell Chrestomanci what happened. If that shop owner really is doing shady things, she needs to know about it. It’s her job, after all. And yours eventually too.”

“Ooh, you’re right.” Ahiru bit her lip. “Do you think I should tell her now, or at dinner?”

Fakir shrugged. “Dinner’s going to be served soon, so it doesn’t matter if you wait a few minutes till then.”

“Yeah, that’s true…”

She stayed where she was, and she and Fakir talked about that day’s magic lesson and what they planned to study later in the evening until everyone else sat down and the footmen came in with their food. At a lull in the adults’ conversation after Mr. Katz rambled about how none of his relatives knew anything about the owner of some abandoned mansion but were discreetly trying to find someone who did, Ahiru finally found the courage to bring up what had happened to her the day before. She took a deep breath. “U-um, Chrestomanci?”

“Yes, Ahiru dear?” Chrestomanci paused, her fork halfway to her mouth. “What is it?”

“U-um, I – I’m sorry to interrupt, but… something happened to me yesterday that I think I should tell you about.” Ahiru twisted her napkin in her lap. “I – I was down in the village, and I was on my way to the candy store, and these two girls wanted to talk to me, so they pulled me into this shop, and while we were in there, the owner –”

“Slow down, Ahiru,” Chrestomanci said gently. “Which shop was this?”

“It was that really creepy old witchcraft supply store, the one with the dirty windows and it’s all dark inside…” Ahiru thought about the first time she’d passed by, when she’d actually looked at the sign. “Um, I think it was called Bookman’s or something.”

“Ah, yes, I’m familiar with that store.” Chrestomanci nodded. “Now, what did the owner do or say that you think I should know about? Or did you see something illegal in his shop?”

Ahiru shook her head. “N-no, I didn’t see anything, but, but when he saw me, he looked like he recognized me, and, and then he tried to buy my pendant and offered me a lot of money for it, and when I said no he kept insisting and he didn’t even care that I broke a jar when he’d been so rude to the girls because he thought they were going to steal, and I was only able to run away when they distracted him.”

“Your pendant?” Chrestomanci frowned. “Why would he desire that?”

“I don’t know.” Ahiru’s hands stilled on the napkin. “That’s what made it so weird.”

“Yes… yes indeed it is very strange.” Chrestomanci exchanged significant glances with Mr. Katz. “Thank you for telling me, Ahiru; I do believe this is something that bears investigating. At the very least, I would prefer it if Mr. Bookman did not harass any of you children further.” She took a sip of her wine. “Are you quite all right now? I can tell that it gave you a scare.”

“It – it did, but I’m fine now.” Ahiru gave her a small smile. “Th-thank you for asking, though.”

“Nonsense.” Chrestomanci waved her hand. “You are in my care; your emotional well-being is a part of that.”

“O-oh, okay.” Ahiru’s smile widened.

The conversations resumed their regular patterns, then, with Ahiru, Rue, and Fakir talking amongst themselves while the adults discussed business down at the other end. So absorbed was she in talking to them that Ahiru didn’t notice that Chrestomanci and Mr. Katz glanced at her more than once, or that when their voices lowered it was to talk about the story she had just related.


	16. Chapter 16

They were nearly finished with breakfast on Monday morning when Anne-Erina entered looking slightly harried. “Begging your pardon, but I’ve been told to relay a message to you.” She curtsied. “Today’s lessons have been cancelled, owing to Mr. Katz’ presence being required by Chrestomanci for her work today. I’ve also been instructed to tell you that under no circumstances are you to go down to the village during your free time today.”

Rue frowned. “Not that I had any intention of doing so, but why?”

“My apologies, but I wasn’t told that. I was only told that I was to inform you of the restriction. Now, if you’ll excuse me…” She curtsied again and left in a hurry.

“Strange,” Rue said aloud as the door shut behind the maid. “Oh well, it isn’t as though I can’t wait until Wednesday to go. Honestly, the thought of going there today wouldn’t even have occurred to me if she hadn’t said anything. I suppose they’re just being careful about whatever it is that’s making them want to forbid us from leaving the castle today.”

“Is that something you’ve done before on days like this?” Ahiru asked. “Gone down to the village, I mean.”

Rue shrugged. “I think maybe once or twice? It’s hard to remember. This doesn’t tend to happen all that often. Things usually run on their normal schedule without interruption. But, you know…” She lifted her cup and drank the last of her tea. “I’m not going to complain about an unexpected free day, even if I am being ‘confined’ to the castle. There’s plenty to do here.” She dabbed at her mouth with her napkin before setting it down beside her plate and rising from her seat. “Which I think I’ll get started on now. I’ll see you two later.”

Ahiru was the next one to get up after Rue left, making her way over to one of the armchairs scattered across the room. She’d left one of her magical theory books there, and intended to spend some of her unexpected free time reading up on it, especially since Fakir would likely be here if she had any questions or needed help understanding a particular passage. She settled herself down into the cushions and opened the book to where she’d marked her place with the bookmark she’d bought herself last Wednesday just before running into those girls. Like the one she had gotten Rue, it too was a watercolor painting of a ballet dancer, but this one was a depiction of a dark-haired male dancer that resembled Fakir. She wasn’t sure why she’d bought it, and felt embarrassed to have left it in a book that had been lying out where he could see it. She stuck it safely away at the back of the book, a slight blush coloring her cheeks.

“Ahiru?”

She looked up to see Fakir standing beside her, and felt her insides squirm. Had he seen the bookmark? She gulped. “Wh-what?”

“I’m going to the library. Do you… want to come with me?”

She relaxed immediately, her face lighting up with happiness. “Of course!” She shut the book and set it aside on the table before bounding out of the chair.

Fakir frowned. “You just lost your place in that book.”

“What? O-oh, that’s, that’s okay, I’ll find it again easily, I know where I was, it was right at the start of a chapter, so I just have to look it up on the table of contents,” Ahiru babbled. She didn’t know why she was so reluctant to pull out the bookmark in front of him, but she was. “Let’s just go, I’m sure you have stuff you really really want to look up!”

“The books aren’t going anywhere, idiot.” He looked amused, the corners of his mouth lifting in a small smile. “There’s no need to rush, especially since we have the whole day free.”

“I – I know,” Ahiru said as she followed him out of the room. “It’s just, well, whenever I want to go do something I’m really interested in I always want to hurry and get there cause I’m just so excited and I can’t wait. Aren’t you ever like that about anything?”

Fakir shrugged. “Not that I can think of.”

“Oh.” Ahiru narrowly avoided walking into a display table with a very old and very expensive looking urn on it. “Well, I’m sure you’ll have it happen someday. There’ll be something or someone you’re really excited to see so you’ll hurry over there as fast as you can.”

“Maybe.”

They walked the rest of the way to the library in silence. Once there, Fakir ignored the shelves on the floor they were on and headed straight for the spiral staircase that led up to the next one. It was just wide enough for him to walk beside Ahiru, so he did, ascending at the same slow pace she did. She clutched onto the railing as she climbed, but nevertheless her feet slipped a couple times on the surface of the stairs. Luckily, Fakir was there, and he caught her each time and steadied her.

“What are you looking for this time?” Ahiru asked as they reached the top of the stairs.

“A few different things.” Fakir walked over to a nearby shelf and began browsing. “I think there’s a section on obscure forms of witchcraft up here, and I also want some information on plants from Series Six.”

“Series Six… which one was that again?” Ahiru peered at the books he was looking at just as he touched the spell plate to change the selection.

“The one where the worlds are going through an ice age.” Fakir took a book from the shelf and opened it up to flip through. “Because of the unique environmental conditions, there are plants there that won’t grow anywhere else, so many of them have to be strictly regulated.”

“Oh yeah, I remember reading a book from there.” Ahiru stepped close to Fakir to look at the book he was flipping through, not noticing that he drew his breath in sharply when her cheek rubbed against his arm. “Ooh, I’ve seen that one before.” She pointed at an illustration of a plant with long, curly blue leaves. “It’s pretty.”

“You have?” Fakir raised an eyebrow at her. “That’s a highly controlled substance.”

“Really?” She looked up at his face, and then back down at the picture. “What’s it for?”

“It’s used to treat burns, and it’s very potent.” Fakir shifted slightly. “The government oversees all the harvesting of it, and only allows licensed apothecaries and doctors to have it. It’s not freely distributed.” He stared down at her as she studied the drawing of the plant. “Where did you see it?”

“Um, my uncle had a jar of it, and I tried to take the lid off so I could see what it smelled like, and he got really mad at me.” Ahiru frowned at the memory. “I didn’t get to smell it cause he interrupted me and yelled at me before making me go away and play in the garden.”

“Hmph. You weren’t missing much – it smells pretty terrible.” Fakir absent-mindedly reached up and scratched his shoulder. “Like rotting fruit.”

“Ew.” Ahiru wrinkled her nose. “How’d you smell it?”

“I – some of it has come through here before, part of Chrestomanci’s job, and she conducts raids on people smuggling or stealing it, you know how it is, and…” He shook his head. “Never mind that, I’m more interested in how your uncle got hold of some.”

“I don’t know.” Ahiru shrugged. “He always had weird stuff lying around that I’d get in trouble for going near, and people would always come by to deliver more or buy some from him. I didn’t really pay attention to all that cause he’d get mad if I tried asking questions. So I learned to just stay out of his way.”

Fakir was quiet for a minute, and Ahiru thought that he was reading more of the book until he spoke again. “What did you think of him?”

“Huh?” Ahiru blinked up at him. “Um, I… I guess I thought… well, I was actually… kinda scared of him.” She swallowed. “He wasn’t nice at all, and he always looked scary, even when he smiled. I was upset when he left me in the orphanage cause it was scary to go to a new place, but I wasn’t sad about leaving his house cause I didn’t like it there either. I don’t miss him at all, not like I’d miss anyone here if I had to leave.”

“I see.” Fakir turned a few more pages. “And – are you still having bad dreams?”

“I’m not sure.” Ahiru moved to look at the books on the shelf again. “Sometimes I wake up and feel like I did, but I don’t remember anything so it doesn’t bother me too much. Other times I wake up and don’t feel like I dreamed at all, or like it was really weird or sometimes even nice.”

“Hmmm. You’ve remembered some of the bad ones, right?”

“Yeah, some of them. They’ve been pretty weird, though.” She turned to look at him again. “Why?”

“Because somewhere around here there should be a section on dream magic and dream interpretation.” Fakir touched the spell plate to change the book selection again. “If you’re interested in deciphering the ones you remember, you should look for some of them.”

“Ooh, really?” Ahiru’s eyes lit up. “That – that sounds great! I’ll go look for them!”

“Do you want me to help you find them?”

“No, that’s okay.” Ahiru shook her head. “You go ahead and look for what you need, I’ll be fine. Thanks anyway!” She rushed off before he could reply, and didn’t notice that he watched her disappear around the corner of a shelf.

It took a bit of searching, but she finally found the section Fakir had mentioned at the end of a long corridor of books, on a shelf up against what must have been the back wall of the castle. She picked out a couple of books on dream symbolism and how to decode them, and then wandered a little further down the wall to see what else was in this particular area. It was somehow even quieter here, it felt like, and it seemed a little darker too. There was almost an otherworldly feel to this part of the library, but it wasn’t spooky. Rather, it seemed very cozy and calming and put her in mind, oddly, of an isolated forest glen.

When it happened, she wasn’t sure what caused it; she’d merely been idly trailing her hand along a shelf while walking. And then the entire bookshelf had made a soft rumbling noise and swung away from her, causing her to stumble forward into a doorway, through which a small hidden room awaited. Ahiru’s jaw dropped as she saw it, and she took another step, but then turned and ran back the way she’d come.

To her relief, Fakir was still in the same spot where she’d left him, more or less, a couple books under his arm as he continued perusing the selection. She rushed up to his side and tugged on his free hand, ignoring the butterflies that swarmed through her stomach at the contact. “Fakir! You have to see this!”

“S-see what?” He turned a curious frown on her. “What do you want me to see?”

“It’s a surprise! Come on!” She tugged his hand again, and started to lead him away.

“What’s this about?” Fakir wondered aloud as he let her lead him along.

“I told you, it’s a surprise.” Ahiru gnawed on her lower lip as she tried to remember the exact path she’d taken. It took her a couple tries and wrong turns, but eventually she led Fakir to where the door was still open. “Look! It’s a little hidden room! Have you ever seen it before?”

“Actually, I haven’t.” Fakir followed her into the little room, his eyes wide with surprise. “How did you find it?”

“I don’t know! I was running my hand over the bookshelf and suddenly it made this noise and it swung in and I saw the room behind it. Woooooow…” Ahiru gazed in wonder at it. It wasn’t very big, but it had the same sort of quiet otherworldliness to it as the library section outside had, and it was very appealing. It was circular, and a curved bookshelf took up the entirety of the wall opposite the door. On the east side of the room, there was a large, round stained glass window depicting the sun in a partly cloudy blue sky, above green earth, and beneath it was a somewhat dusty old wooden roll-top desk and chair. On the west side was another stained glass window, this one depicting a crescent moon in a star-studded night sky above the sea, and below it a large and very comfortable looking old sofa. “I wonder who uses this room…”

Fakir ran his finger over the desk’s surface. “Judging by the layer of dust, no one has for a while.”

“Awwww. That’s a shame – it’s such a neat little room.” Ahiru sat down on the couch and bounced up and down a bit. “Maybe it was somebody’s secret study room and they left it behind or something.” She looked up at him. “Should we tell anyone we found it?”

Fakir shrugged. “It’s up to you if you want to tell anyone. It doesn’t seem like anyone’s using it for anything suspicious, so you don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

“I – I kind of don’t want to.” Ahiru blushed and smiled. “I kind of want to keep it our little secret. Like the adventure we had in the tower!”

“Then do that.” He glanced at the books she was still carrying. “So you found something you wanted?”

“Yeah! I was able to find the section on dreams that you told me about, so I got a couple. It looks like you found stuff too?”

“I did, but I’m not done yet.” Fakir walked back towards the little room’s doorway. “I’m going to go finish looking.”

“Wait, I’ll go with you!” Ahiru got up and hurried over to him. While he waited, she inspected the shelf she’d been touching when the door opened, and located it after a minute of searching: the tiny, barely visible button that looked like part of the wood. She pressed it again, and the bookshelf swung shut again with a small click.

She followed him back to the sections he needed, and hung about close to him while he found what he wanted. They descended the spiral staircase back to the library’s first floor, Ahiru just as careful and slow as she had been on the trip upwards, if not more so. She luckily didn’t slip, to the deep relief of the both of them.

“Do you think you’ll ever feel less afraid around stairs?” Fakir asked as they walked out of the library.

“I’m not sure.” Ahiru hung her head. “It’s just so scary being high up… I used to think it’d be neat to be a bird and be able to fly up really high, but then I climbed that tree even though I was kinda scared, and I ended up falling and breaking my neck and I died and I always think of that when I’m going up or down stairs.” She missed the expression that passed over Fakir’s face at the mention of her death. “I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing?” Fakir frowned. “I’m not mad at you for being afraid of something completely understandable. Anyone would be after an experience like that.”

“W-well, cause, cause I know it must be annoying to have to wait for me to climb so slowly when you probably want to just get on with it.” She swallowed. “It must be really irritating for you.”

“It’s fine. I really don’t mind.” He shifted the books he was carrying. “You shouldn’t worry about it. It’s not a big deal.”

“O-okay…”

When he opened the door to let them both back into the playroom, they were both surprised by what they saw in there: Rue and Uzura seated at the table, with coloring books and crayons spread out in front of them. The sound of the door opening drew their attention, and they turned to see who’d come in. Uzura’s little face lit up with a smile, and she jumped down from her chair and ran over to Fakir and Ahiru. “Fakir! Ahiru! Did you come to play too zura?”

“No, but we will now that we’re here.” Uzura’s face fell and then brightened again so quickly it was comical. “Show me what you’re doing.”

“Okay zura!” Uzura grabbed Fakir’s hand and pulled him over to the table. “We’re making the pictures pretty zura.”

Fakir’s eyes met Rue’s, and she gave him an amused look that he understood when he looked down. While Rue had filled the drawings in neatly with utterly sensible color combinations, Uzura had put together various shades that seemed to make no sense at all, and frequently went outside the lines. She had even drawn what he could only assume was a crude reproduction of a plaid pattern, on a penguin that was playing the piano. “I see.” He ruffled her hair. “You’ve done a very good job, then.”

“Thank you zura!” She climbed back into her chair and picked up a green crayon. “You should color some too zura!”

Fakir started to say something, but was interrupted by Anne-Erina bustling in to bring them all lunch. He and Ahiru helped Rue and Uzura clear off the table and set their own books safely aside before sitting down to eat. After they were all done, Uzura reluctantly allowed Fakir to carry her back to her room for a nap, but only after extracting a promise that they would all go for a walk around the castle grounds with her when she woke up. They had nearly two hours of peace and quiet to themselves before she burst back into the room, banging on her drum and urging them to hurry and get up and go with her. There was nothing else for it but to obey, and so they all set down what they were doing and took her outside.

The ground was still damp from a brief rain they’d had the previous evening, so they more than once had to pull Uzura away from some large mud puddles. She only slipped out of their grasp once, and enthusiastically jumped into a puddle of water that was deeper than it looked. The end result was that Fakir, who was the one unlucky enough to be chasing her, got drenched, and so did Uzura, who slipped and fell into the water that, for her, was halfway up to her small knees. She sat there giggling while Fakir glowered down at her.

“Now, Uzura, that’s not very funny,” Rue reprimanded her as she gently pulled the little girl out of the puddle. “It’s not nice to splash people.”

“I didn’t mean to zura!” Uzura protested. “And he looks funny all wet zura!”

“Well…” Rue’s mouth twitched as she glanced at Fakir. “Okay, maybe a little. But you still shouldn’t do that, okay? You’re all soaked now too. It’s warm enough now that we don’t have to take you back right away, but if you misbehave again, we will. So stay with us and don’t jump into any more puddles.”

“Okay zura.”

“Good. Now let’s go look at the orchards, maybe some of the fruit is ripe.” Rue took Uzura’s hand and led her away.

“Are you okay?” Ahiru asked as she and Fakir followed the other two.

“Hmph. It’s just a little water.” Fakir folded his arms. “She really needs to learn to listen to us, though.”

“Yeah, I noticed that…” Ahiru glanced up at him. “If – if you’re cold, we can go back and get a coat or you could change and come back out here.”

“I’m fine. Let’s just take her to the orchards and then go back.”

“All right…”

They walked through the flower garden to get to the orchards, and Uzura was surprisingly obedient when Fakir warned her not to pick any flowers, perhaps because of Rue’s threat to cut short their walk if she didn’t mind them. The entire time, the familiar specter of the ruined wall hovered off in the distance to the side, but they ignored it.

Which was why it so surprised them when they ran into it between the flower garden and the orchard. In Ahiru’s case, it was literal: she collided with the corner of it, and stumbled back, rubbing her nose. “Owwww…”

“How did we get here?” Rue gaped up at the wall in front of them. “I – I always see this thing whenever I’m outside, but I’ve never been able to make it here before. I eventually stopped trying.”

“I don’t know.” Fakir shook his head as he stared at the steep staircase that jutted out of it some ways away from where they stood. It was overgrown with weeds and vines and snapdragons, and was only visible now that they were so close to the wall itself. He hadn’t seen it in years, and only barely remembered it. “I’ve been here once before, but I don’t remember how. I wasn’t even paying attention to it today.”

“Neither was I,” Ahiru said thoughtfully. “Maybe that’s the trick? Maybe we all have to kinda ignore it and not really look straight at it? I was seeing it out of the corner of my eye, but I never looked right at it.”

“I didn’t either.” Rue brushed her hand over the weather-beaten stones. “That seems as good a theory as any.” She turned to them with a conspiratorial smile. “Well. Since we’re here, it seems like it would be a terrible waste not to go up there and explore it. Don’t you think?”

“Up – up the stairs?” Ahiru gulped. The staircase didn’t look safe at all, not with all those vines and leaves and flower petals to slip on, and that was before you even got to the fact that there wasn’t a banister or hand rail, only a mostly smooth wall to clutch onto, which most likely would be a futile effort. “I – I don’t know, I don’t think we’re supposed to. Right, Uzura?” She turned to Uzura with desperation on her face.

“I want to see it zura.” Uzura was clearly on Rue’s side in this; Ahiru’s shoulders sagged in defeat. “It looks interesting zura. Come on zura!” She ran off towards the stairs.

“That’s the spirit!” Rue grinned. “Come on, Ahiru, let’s have some fun.”

Climbing up a steep, treacherous staircase was not Ahiru’s idea of fun, but she went after them anyway. Or she started to, at least – she had only gone a few steps when Fakir gently took her hand. “Ahiru…”

“Fakir?” She turned to look back at him. “Wh-what is it?”

“If you’re scared, you don’t have to do this,” Fakir said quietly. “Isn’t that how you lost your second life, by climbing something you were afraid to climb? You should learn from that and not repeat your mistake.”

“I – I know, it was, but… but this time I’m not by myself.” Ahiru forced a brave smile onto her face. “I have you here, so I’m not as afraid. You’ll help me, right?”

“Of – of course. If you’re really sure you want to climb up there, that is,” he added.

“Well, not really, but – but I am kinda curious about what’s up there, and anyway I don’t want to be teased or scared forever, so – so even if I don’t really want to I should. Right?”

“Don’t be stupid. That’s not a good reason to do something.” Fakir sighed. “If it’s what you want to do, that’s one thing, I’ll help you, but if you don’t really want to, you don’t have to. It’s all right to be afraid, and none of us would tease you for it.”

“I – I know, but I kinda feel like I have to try. It’s hard to explain.” She hurried off after the other two. Fakir followed, stumbling a little at first because she’d rushed off while he was still holding her hand.

She didn’t get the chance to attempt it, though, because she and Fakir caught up with Rue and Uzura just as the latter took one step up onto the stairs. And as soon as she took that one step, one of the gardeners from the flower garden appeared, looking furious and a little out of breath. “You’re not allowed up there! That’s Chrestomanci’s private garden!”

“But I’m Chrestomanci’s daughter zura!” Uzura insisted.

“It doesn’t matter.” He pushed past Rue and picked up Uzura. She struggled, but he kept a firm grip on her and deposited her a good distance away. She tried to run back, but he moved faster than any of them could see and planted himself firmly at the foot of the stairs, blocking their access. “Move along now, all of you. Go back to the castle.”

“But I want to see it zura!” Uzura whined.

“Forget it, Uzura, he’s not going to let us,” Fakir said. He bent and scooped the unhappy Uzura into his arms. “We have to go back anyway and get ourselves dry and change clothes, because it’s starting to get cold.”

“I’m not cold zura.” Uzura squirmed and tried to break free of Fakir’s grasp. “I want to stay out here zura.”

“Maybe you aren’t, but I am. Do you want me to get sick?” Fakir asked her as he carried her away, Rue and Ahiru hurrying to follow.

“Well… no zura,” Uzura admitted, slumping down a little.

“I didn’t think so. And I don’t want you to get sick either, so we’re taking you back too.” Fakir and Ahiru’s eyes met as she caught up, and the relief at not having to try climbing the stairs after all was evident in both their faces.


	17. Chapter 17

Ahiru was dreaming.

She didn’t know she was dreaming, as people sometimes do in their dreams, though she did have a vague sense that something wasn’t right. In the dream, she was wandering around her uncle’s house, and the hallways were stretched into impossible lengths and distorted because she wasn’t seeing right. She knew, the way you know things in a dream, that it was because she had just come in from the sunlit garden at the back of the mansion and it was dark inside, thus her eyes were still adjusting. It was always dark in her uncle’s house. But it was never silent: whichever way Ahiru turned, she was guaranteed to see a clock looming up from the shadows, ticking steadily away and chiming to mark the hours. Their dim light lent an eerie glow to the faces of the countless puppets on display in glass cases and on dusty shelves. More than once she thought she saw one move, but when she looked back it was motionless. Nevertheless, she became aware of a susurrus coming from behind her as she walked that silenced itself when she turned her head around to check, and resumed as soon as she was facing forward once more.

She stumbled around half-blind through the gloomy corridors, clutching the bouquet of flowers she had picked. They were vague things that had loosely defined shape and color and were distinctly separate objects, but she couldn’t have told anyone, if asked, which specific flowers they were. She bumped into more than one wall, and a couple of tables, and was intensely relieved when she didn’t hear an accompanying crash afterwards. Her uncle would be furious if she broke anything; that was something she had always known in the waking world as well.

After what was either an hour or a few minutes – it was so hard to tell in dreams – Ahiru rounded a corner and came face to face with a case that held an oversized puppet that had been specially made to look like her uncle. It loomed over her, its features terrifyingly malformed to her in her current state, and she let out a loud cry as she stumbled backwards, mistaking it for the genuine article. She turned and ran down a different hall, but this one was even darker, and so she didn’t see what tripped her as she fell forward onto her face.

When she got up, she found that she’d held onto her flowers, but now they were all tied together by a red ribbon she didn’t recall putting there. They hadn’t gotten crushed by her fall, but there seemed somehow to be fewer of them. She frowned, and counted them.

Yes.

One was missing.

Ahiru blinked down at the bouquet. How could that be? She looked all around her, to see if it had slipped out of her hand onto the floor, but there were no other flowers there. She counted again. The same results. She kept on counting and recounting, until she was no longer sure anymore that there ever had been another flower to go missing. A repulsive smell hovered in the air, making her cough, and she raised a hand to rub her watery eyes, and –

– opened her eyes to find herself in an unfamiliar bed.

She wasn’t sure, at first, where she was. Everything was so different – the room, the bright sunlight streaming in from a spot where the curtains had been left partway open, even her own body felt different. Taller. Older.

“Wh-what… where… where am…” Ahiru took a few deep, gulping breaths as the memories began to filter back in and she slowly started to recall where she was. She was in Chrestomanci Castle, in her own room. She’d been living here for nearly two months. This was her room, her bed; her things were on the bedside table and in the wardrobe. Soon, a maid would be coming in to make sure she was awake, and run her bath for her. She would go to another room nearby to have breakfast with her friends Fakir and Rue. And then they would… would they have lessons? What day was it? She racked her brain for something that would give her a clue.

It wasn’t Monday. They’d had no class on Monday, because Mr. Katz had gone with Chrestomanci to… what had they done? They’d told her about it at dinner that night, they’d… they’d… oh, yes, they’d gone to investigate that creepy shop, and found it abandoned and empty. So Mr. Katz had returned to teaching lessons on Tuesday. They’d practiced Performative Speech again. That was where her memory stopped: after she went to bed that night. So that meant today was Wednesday. Wednesdays were free days, and she and Rue and Fakir always went down to the village. There were no lessons to worry about.

Yet she could not relax; the dream haunted her. She barely heard anything Anne-Erina said when she came in to help her get ready, and if she responded in any way, she couldn’t remember afterwards what she’d said. She bathed and dressed while still in a distracted daze, and trudged to the playroom with her stomach churning in anxiety. She sank down not into her usual chair, but the first one she came to, which was next to Fakir, and piled food onto her plate without really knowing what she was doing. She picked up her fork, but found that she lacked the appetite to eat and so merely held the utensil over the food.

“Ahiru?” Her strange behavior hadn’t escaped Rue’s attention, and she was staring at her with mingled confusion and concern on her face. So was Fakir. “Are you all right?”

“Huh?” Ahiru gave her a blank look. “What? I – I’m fine, really… really…”

“Then why aren’t you eating? And since when do you take any eggs?” Fakir asked. “You’re acting weird.”

“Wh-what? I…” Ahiru looked at him, and then at Rue again, and then back down at her plate. Just as Fakir had said, there was a pile of scrambled eggs on her plate. The smell of them drifted up to her nose, and she felt even sicker, but it cleared her mind somewhat. “Oh… oh… yeah, I…” She gulped, and tried not to gag as she averted her eyes from the food. “Um, I… um… I had this… I had this dream…”

“Another bad one?” Rue asked. Ahiru nodded. “Do you remember what it was about?”

“Y-yeah.” Ahiru’s hand shook, and she set down the fork with a clatter. “I was in my uncle’s house and everything looked really weird and I couldn’t see right cause I’d been outside and he always kept it really dark so I kept bumping into stuff and then I saw this… this puppet.” She shuddered. “It looked just like him, he had it specially made that way and it was really tall, and I… for some reason I felt like I was really little again, I mean I’m not tall now but you know what I mean… and it was really scary so I ran away and I tripped and I…” She trailed off, frowning. “I – I feel like… like… I kinda feel like I lost something and I wasn’t sure what but I knew I lost it and I couldn’t find it and it made it no sense, and then I woke up and I wasn’t sure where I was at first.”

“Is this the first time you’ve had that dream?” Fakir looked vaguely unsettled too. “Or has it happened before?”

“I don’t know.” Ahiru shook her head. “It’s only the first time I remember having it, but it could’ve happened before any of those times where I woke up and I didn’t remember my dreams but I knew I’d had a bad one.” She shrank down a little in her seat. “It… it was so creepy, I’m already starting to forget it but I can’t stop thinking about it. It was like being back in his house only scarier.”

“Well, you’re here now, and he’s dead. You don’t have to worry.” Rue tried to give her an encouraging smile. “It was just a dream. I’m sure you’ll feel better once you’ve eaten and we’re on our way to the village. Which reminds me: you need to stick close to one or both of us while we’re there, so those girls can’t catch you alone.” She reached across the table and took Ahiru’s plate so that she could scrape the eggs back into the serving dish.

“Y-yeah. And thanks.” Ahiru found that her breakfast was more appealing now, though she still felt slightly queasy. She ate slowly so as not to further upset her stomach, and didn’t notice that Fakir kept glancing at her out of the corner of his eye, concern showing in his face for just a split-second every time before he reassumed his usual neutral expression.

She was the first to jump up from the table once they’d all finished, despite having eaten the least, so eager was she to get out of the castle and into the myriad distractions the village would offer. She had to be convinced to slow down and put her coat on, because despite the bright sunlight outside it was extremely chilly, and Rue claimed to have seen frost on her window when she woke up. So she bundled herself up and headed off with them, glad that it was a short walk.

“Where do you want to go first?” Rue asked her as the three walked along through the village streets. It seemed quieter than usual, somehow; perhaps it was the cold of the morning, making people not want to go outside if possible.

“Hmmm, I don’t know.” Ahiru kicked at a small pebble and missed. “I guess maybe the candy store, though I was also thinking of getting a costume for Halloween cause it’s coming up soon and all and I’ve never gotten to pick out my own outfit for it.”

“You got to celebrate it at the orphanage?” Rue looked surprised. “We didn’t at the one I was at.”

“Yeah, a little bit.” Ahiru nodded. “They’d give us costumes and we’d do a little trick or treating and then come back and have dinner and then go to bed, only we were allowed to stay up late just that one night so we could tell scary stories. I always got most of my candy stolen and everyone tried to scare me, but I liked dressing up and going trick or treating. It was nice to get outside the orphanage and pretend to be somebody else for a while.” She looked up at them. “Do you do anything special at the castle?”

“A bit.” Rue shrugged. “We have a nice dinner full of all kinds of traditional treats, and we usually play some games with Uzura, and there’s candy, but that’s it. Uzura’s too young for us to tell scary stories to, and we don’t really dress up anymore.”

“How come?”

“Well… last year was the first time I didn’t, because there were guests at the castle and we had to dress more formally to welcome them. And Fakir hasn’t in years; I guess he’s just not interested anymore. But I want to know what you were thinking of wearing,” Rue added. “Did you have something specific in mind?”

“Y-yeah.” Ahiru blushed. “I – I was thinking of getting a ballerina costume, I’ve always wanted to wear one cause my mother was one, but I’ve never gotten one. Usually they just made me dress up like a witch or a ghost.” She frowned. “I had to be a ghost last year, and some of the kids said it was a good costume for me cause it covered up my face.”

“Oh Ahiru, that’s awful.” Rue’s face crumpled with sadness. “They were wrong and cruel to say that to you, and were just plain wrong in general. Try and remember that, okay? You have a very pretty face and you should never hide it.”

“I – I don’t know about that, but okay. I’ll try.”

“I mean it.” Rue looked stern now. “If you want to wear a ballerina costume for Halloween, you should, because the point of dressing up is to have fun, and I think it will help you feel better about yourself when you see how lovely you look in it. And I’ll gladly help you do your hair, if you want.”

Ahiru brightened a little at that. “Okay! That sounds fun!”

As they rounded a corner, a familiar yet also unfamiliar sight greeted their eyes. It was the shop that Ahiru had been dragged into by the two girls who were so infatuated with Fakir. The window was no less dirty, but the door swung open in the chilly autumn breeze, bringing with it the mournful sound of the bell attached to it. Just past the grimy glass, they could see that it no longer had any items for sale in it. There was nothing in it at all, in fact, just as Chrestomanci and Mr. Katz had spoken of over dinner on Monday night. It had been completely abandoned, seemingly in the night, with few traces of its former owner left behind.

“How could it be emptied out so fast?” Ahiru peered into the shop through the window. There were some new smudges on it, but otherwise it looked exactly the same. “And why?”

“I think Mr. Katz was right.” Fakir came up to stand beside Ahiru, giving a glance over his shoulder to make sure Pike and Lilie weren’t in the area, or to warn them if they were. He had no intention of leaving her side for a moment today, not if there was a chance of them trying to accost her again. “The owner must’ve been up to no good, and when you ran off, he guessed that you’d probably tell the castle what happened, and decided he wasn’t going to take any chances. So he packed everything up and ran.”

“Yeah, probably…” Ahiru pressed her nose against the glass. “See, there’s the powder I spilled, and the broken jar. He didn’t even bother cleaning that up before he left, he must’ve been in a hurry.”

“Not surprising.” Rue came up to stand on Ahiru’s other side and looked inside. “Ugh, I never liked this place to begin with. There was always something shady about it, to my mind. It doesn’t surprise me that that old man was dealing in illegal things. Good riddance.”

“I still wanna know why he wanted to buy my pendant, though.” Ahiru glanced down at where the pendant hung around her neck, hidden from view by her coat. “I still don’t get that. It was so weird.”

Fakir shrugged. “Just be glad he’s not here to try it again. It would’ve been better if he had been arrested, but at least he’s not around to bother you anymore.” He glanced over his shoulder again, and saw what looked like Pike and Lilie duck back into a shop across the street; he scowled in their direction and hoped they saw.

“Y-yeah, I guess so, but I still –”

Whatever Ahiru would have said next they never knew. Her words were drowned out by the deafening roar of an explosion, and they turned as one to see a geyser of water erupting high above the roofs of the buildings and shops on some other street nearby. Before they had time to react to that, a few more explosions rocked the town, and the ground rumbled beneath their feet. They could hear people screaming by now, and then in the next second windows began to shatter all on their own and the bell in the bell tower started clanging wildly and terribly off-key.

“What the hell?” Fakir’s voice could barely be heard above the din. The ground shook more violently this time, and Ahiru nearly fell over, but he grabbed her and steadied her. The sound of flapping wings filled the air, and a huge quantity of black birds rushed by them down the street. “What’s going on?”

“I – I don’t…” Rue’s eyes widened as she saw what was rounding the corner up ahead: a gang of paper skeletons, witches, ghosts, and goblins, obviously having come to life and escaped a shop. They marched down the street waving their flat arms and making a cacophony of strange noises. “I – all I can tell is that this isn’t natural, and that we certainly shouldn’t try to handle it ourselves.” She drew a deep breath. “Chrestomanci! Chrestomanci! Come quickly, we need help!”

And between one blink of an eye and the next, she was there. She took one look at the chaos that had swiftly erupted all over town, and then at the three. “Run,” she said in a voice that was surprisingly calm considering what she had just been summoned into. “Run along home. Now.”

They didn’t need to run very far – by some magic she had used without their realizing it as she did, they were deposited back at the beginning of the short path back to the castle. They stared for a few seconds at what they could see from that vantage point, and then obeyed her orders and hurried back up to the castle. The ground was still and unmoving here, and nothing looked like it had been disturbed, the windows all intact and nothing out of place or moving when it shouldn’t have. The sheer ordinariness of it all was almost eerie when held up in comparison to what they had just left; it seemed somehow that things should’ve been more chaotic, but everything was quiet and peaceful.

Still shaken up, they walked back to the door they always used to enter and leave the castle. As they walked into the main hall and towards the staircase, Anne-Erina rushed up to meet them, looking flustered and out of breath. “Ah… Miss Ahiru…”

“Y-yes?” Ahiru stopped walking. “What is it?”

“There’s, there’s…” She took a few breaths. “You have a visitor, Miss Ahiru, waiting for you in the parlor.”

“What?” Ahiru stared at her. “Who – who would visit me? A-and where’s the parlor?”

“If you’ll come this way, I’ll show you.” Anne-Erina set off down one of the corridors, and Ahiru followed. Rue and Fakir exchanged glances, and then followed closely behind Ahiru.

Anne-Erina led them to a richly gilded door not far from the main entrance hall, and opened it to let them in. “I’ll let you have some privacy,” she said, and closed the door behind them once they had all entered.

At first, as they walked further into the room, it didn’t seem like anyone was in there. Then Ahiru saw them: the enormous, brightly colored feathers sticking out to the sides of one of the high-backed chairs. She barely had time to process this before the occupant of the chair rose and moved to stand beside it, smiling his terrifying smile at her. “Hello, little Ahiru. It’s been a long time, hasn’t it?”

“U-uncle D-Drosselmeyer…” Ahiru stumbled backwards into Fakir and Rue, all the color draining out of her face. “Y-you… b-but… but… they, they… they t-told me…”

“That I was dead?” His smile widened and his eyes shone with what could have been madness. “Dear dear, what a dreadful error. How terrible to make a young girl grieve when I yet live.” He extended one gloved hand in her direction. “Ah, well. Now you can come home with me at long last.”

“What?!” The word burst forth from all three of them at the same time. Drosselmeyer’s gaze slid over to Rue and then Fakir in turn, and he gave them both disdainful looks before returning his attention to Ahiru, who was staring in horror at him. “But – but – I live here now!”

“Don’t be silly, little Ahiru.” He shook his head. “You belong with your family, not a bunch of strangers in a cold place like this. Eh? Don’t you think so?”

“It’s not cold! And they’re not strangers!” Ahiru was beginning to tremble. “This – this is my home now! I – I’m learning magic here, and – and I really like everyone, and – I – I have to stay! I’m going to be the next Chrestomanci!”

“Nonsense,” he said firmly. “I’m sure it’s been a lovely little vacation for you, but that’s come to an end now. As I said, you belong with your real family, and –”

“Excuse me,” Rue interrupted, in her coldest and most imperious voice. She stepped forward to stand in front of Ahiru. “You may be her biological relative, but the fact is that Chrestomanci has legally adopted Ahiru as her ward. Even if you think you still have a claim on her, you cannot take her away at this time because you no longer have custody of her.”

Drosselmeyer gave her a contemptuous look. “My my, how bold of you to speak to an adult like that, little princess.” Rue’s eyes widened with fury, and she opened her mouth to say something, but he spoke over her. “It may be that this Chrestomanci has adopted my dear niece, but how was that possible? Eh? Eh? Only because I was presumed to be dead. Since I clearly am alive…” He spread his arms and grinned. “The government will naturally favor her biological relative over some stranger.”

“Be that as it may, you’re still legally dead in the eyes of the law.” Fakir moved to stand beside Rue and present a united front. “Until you can get that mess sorted out, Ahiru will have to stay here. And Chrestomanci, in case you don’t know, is a government employee herself, one of the most important.”

The smile faded from Drosselmeyer’s face, and Rue and Fakir perhaps finally understood, fully, why Ahiru was so terrified of him. “So she will stay here until then? And then what? Eh? Eh? Chrestomanci will attempt some legal trickery and lean on her cronies in order to keep my poor niece from returning to her rightful home and her only living blood relative? And I, as a humble warlock, will be able to do nothing to stop her? How can that be justice? How can that be right?”

“She obviously doesn’t want to go with you, for one thing,” Rue said frostily. “And even beyond that, it’s been determined that she is a nine-lived enchanter, and thus will be taking over the title of Chrestomanci eventually. She must remain here for her magic training, if nothing else.”

“Nonsense,” he said again, waving his hand dismissively. “The girl has no magic, I determined that myself long ago. An error must have been made. And even if she were gifted, I have my own talents and can teach her all she needs.”

“I don’t think so.” Fakir folded his arms. “You said it yourself – you’re a warlock. You’re incapable of using higher levels of magic, all of which Ahiru needs extensive, comprehensive education in if she is to be prepared for the position she’ll be taking on. You can’t provide that for her.”

“You dare suggest I cannot adequately provide for my own niece?” He seemed to grow in size then, his eyes flashing with rage. “Who are you that you think you can speak to me this way? Eh? Eh? Her would-be knight? I tell you right now, she has no need of you, little boy, and once I have taken her back to her true home, I shall make her see that. In time she will forget all about you and about this dreadful place as well. As it should be.”

“You’re delusional!” Rue snapped, her face flushed with her growing anger. “Ahiru loves it here, and she would never forget this place, or either of us! Or anyone here! This is her home now, and you can’t take her away from it!”

“It was never her home!” He stomped his foot on the carpet. “She belongs with her true family, not this – this sham! This could never be her home!”

“But it is! And you seem to be confusing ‘biological’ with ‘real’.” Rue tossed her hair. “We are her real family now. She doesn’t want to go back with you. Accept it, and get out of this castle!”

“Who are you, little princess, that you think you have the right to order me about? You –”

“What’s going on?” It was Mr. Katz, standing at the double glass doors at the back of the parlor. He had one of his wedding magazines in his hands, and looked half-awake and slightly rumpled, as if the shouting had awoken him from a sunlit nap. He looked over at Drosselmeyer. “Ah. I believe we have not been introduced – can I help you, sir? I am Mr. Katz…”

“That depends.” Drosselmeyer’s expression became something of a sneer. “Do you have the power to discipline these children for behaving so rudely to a guest? Eh?”

Mr. Katz glanced at Rue and Fakir, taking in the anger on their faces. Something flickered in his eyes, but he maintained a neutral expression as he looked back at Drosselmeyer. “My apologies, but I’m still lacking context, Mr…?”

“Drosselmeyer.” His eyes narrowed. “I am the uncle of your employer’s ward, wrongfully presumed dead and here now to retrieve my young niece. These upstarts have had the gall to argue with me and insist that I lack the right to take my own property with me.”

Mr. Katz’ mustache twitched. “I see.” He directed his attention to the other two. “Miss Rue, Mr. Fakir, would you please allow me to speak to Mr. Drosselmeyer in private? I believe this is a matter for the adults.”

“But –” Rue started to protest. Mr. Katz shook his head.

“Now.” His tone brooked no further objection. Rue sighed.

“Fine.” She looked over at Fakir. “Come on, let’s go, we’ll take Ahiru to the kitchen and get her some tea.” They turned their backs on Drosselmeyer and Mr. Katz so they could leave, but froze in horror in the next instant.

Because Ahiru was gone.


	18. Chapter 18

Ahiru ran. She ran without thought or care as to where she was going, caring only that she got far away from the danger that had come out of her past and invaded her new home. Why her first instinct had been to run she wasn’t entirely sure, only that she needed to hide until it was safe to come out again. She had not thought about how she would know for certain when that time was, but that was something she could ponder later. All that mattered now was escape.

Her uncle was alive. He was alive, and he wanted to take her away from the castle, away from everyone she’d come to know and care about, from the first real home she’d ever known. Away from Fakir, and Rue, and Uzura. Could any revelation have been more horrifying to her in that moment? She couldn’t think of one. The mere idea of having to leave and go back to his horrible mansion was unspeakably terrifying; she found she was having trouble thinking straight for all the fear that was choking her.

She paused to catch her breath partway through the flower garden, bracing herself with one hand against a rhododendron tree. As she stood there sweating and gasping, her legs sore and her heart pounding, someone tugged on her skirt.

“Ahiru?” It was Uzura. Of course it was Uzura. “What are you doing zura?”

“I… I’m…” Ahiru took a few deep breaths. “No-nothing important, I just… I just… I just have to…”

“To what zura?” Uzura tilted her head in confusion. “Were you looking for me zura? Am I in trouble again zura?”

“What? No. If anyone’s in trouble, it’s…” Ahiru let out a sound that was half sob, half laugh. “I – I have to go. I’m sorry.” She bent down and gave Uzura a brief, tight hug. “Goodbye, Uzura!” She took off running again, though her aching legs protested mightily. She would’ve rested longer if Uzura hadn’t found her, but now she needed to get away.

“Wait for me zura!” Uzura shouted after her. “Where are you going zura? I want to go with you zura! Ahiruuuuuu!”

I’m sorry, Ahiru thought. I’m so sorry, Uzura. I wish I could stay with you, but… I can’t. She could hear Uzura’s footsteps behind her as she tried to follow her, but there was no way she could catch up, so they soon faded as she kept running, trying to think of a good place to hide.

As if it knew what she needed, the ruined wall loomed up before her almost immediately after she exited the flower garden. She nearly ran headlong into it, but skidded to a stop just in time, although she slipped and sat down hard on the muddy ground at the foot of the stairs. She expected another angry gardener to come marching up and forcibly drag her away, but none came even though she remained sitting there for a few minutes to catch her breath and stare up at the wall. When at last she felt ready to stand up, she moved without hesitation to place one foot on the bottom step. Perhaps that was what triggered the appearance of the gardeners?

But nothing happened. It seemed to be some sort of grand cosmic stroke of luck. Trembling with fear, Ahiru began to slowly climb the steep staircase, clutching onto the wall and pressing herself as much against it as she could so as put as much space as possible between herself and the sheer drop on the other side.

It was the most frightful climb of her young life. Even the stairs in the castle tower were as nothing compared to it, and this time she lacked the security of knowing Fakir was there to help her if she tripped. Still, whatever was up there seemed to her right now to be the best sort of hiding place, and she was curious about it anyway, so she kept on despite her fear. She went very slowly and carefully, feeling rather incapable of rushing, and so it took what felt like an extremely long time to reach the top. The stairs ended in a narrow gap between both sides of the wall, and she squeezed herself through into a small stretch of mossy ground in front of what looked like a forest. A worn stone path started at her feet and wound into the trees; Ahiru wasted no time at all in following it.

It was colder in the relative darkness of the dense wood, and even wrapped in her thick coat Ahiru shivered. She did not at first notice that the trees seemed to be moving around her, going this way and that and sliding out of her way as she walked, and when it finally did become obvious to her she was sure it was only her imagination, or a trick of what little light managed to make it through the branches. She did, however, notice a slight decline in the chill of the air as she walked on, and when she emerged into a small dell, was shocked at what she saw and felt.

A rainbow of flower buds on the verge of blossoming dotted the little valley, and all the trees she could see before her were cherry trees in full blossom. A gentle breeze whispered through the trees, and sent a cloud of pink petals across the dell, some of them falling into her hair or onto her shoulders. The air was cool and sweet and seemed to sing of spring and all its promises. Despite the circumstances that had driven her here, Ahiru could not help but feel her mood lift in that place, her spirits buoyed by the scents and sights and some intangible feeling that permeated this little paradise. She hated to leave it, but her curiosity about what lay ahead was too great for her not to continue and so she kept walking, though at a gradual pace so as to savor everything about where she was.

At the end of the dell she came into another stretch of trees. They at first were cherry trees, but eventually gave way to weeping willows with vivid green leaves. The air grew slowly warmer and more humid as she passed amongst them, and she soon came to a great sandy expanse dotted with palm trees and cacti, and all sorts of brightly colored succulents. Some looked spiky and rough, others shiny and smooth, and still others soft and velvety. She would have admired them more if she were not growing more and more uncomfortable in her heavy coat and long dress. She was on the verge of removing her coat when at last she came to the end of the hot, sunny stretch and found herself in cooler, crisper air and surrounded by tall trees bearing autumn foliage on their lengthy branches. She could see ripened fruits and nuts hanging high in some of the trees, fallen leaves blanketed the ground, and the sunlight here was softer and more subdued than it had been in the summery area back there. She left her coat on, and was glad she did as the temperature began to further drop. The trees began to lose their leaves, though some sprouted red berries and others white blossoms, and tall pines started to appear, their scent strong but appealing. Soon a delicate layer of frost was draped over everything, and snow crunched beneath her feet. Ahiru shivered and pulled her coat up higher around her neck, wishing fervently that she had brought a scarf and gloves with her today. It was hard to appreciate the lovely winter flowers when you were struggling to keep warm like this.

But the harsh chill soon abated, and the bare, black trees gave way to oaks and rhododendrons much like those in the ordinary gardens on the castle grounds. She had not walked far among them when she came to a clearing. It was a circular bit of meadowland, with all the trees on the outer edges save for one in the center, an apple tree that cast a great shadow over some ruins there. There was a small spring of water that bubbled up seemingly from nowhere near its roots, the water clear and almost golden in the sunlight. The ruins were that of some ancient-looking archway through which she could see the other end of the clearing; the two pillars on either side were intact, but the top of it had broken off and lay between them.

As Ahiru walked towards it, the air between the archway’s pillars shimmered like a heat mirage, and a tall, indistinct dark figure appeared within it. Ahiru froze in place, thinking at first that it was some sort of guardian of the ruins that she had disturbed. However, even that would have been preferable to the person who did emerge, stepping over the fallen stone as they moved forward: her uncle, followed by three men in dark cloaks, their faces hidden by their hoods. She took a couple of steps back, and as she did there was some sort of loud popping noise from behind the last cloaked man to step out of the portal. Drosselmeyer frowned at it, and then shrugged before turning and directing his attention to Ahiru.

“Ah, little Ahiru.” He was smiling, but it was the icy half-grimace she had come to associate with being in a lot of trouble, an expression that she had never been able to forget in the five years she had lived apart from him. “How dreadful of you to run away. Do you know how much trouble I had to go through to locate you and then bring my associates here with me? Eh? Eh? Having that portal opened on such short notice cost me a pretty penny, and now it’s closed before I can even take you back through it. At least there are other ways of opening one, but I had hoped not to have to resort to that.” He sighed.

“No – please – please – no!” Ahiru shook her head, a pleading look on her face. “Please don’t take me away! I love it here – I need to learn magic – I don’t want to leave!”

“Do you really think any of that will sway me? Eh?” He waved a dismissive, white-gloved hand. “All of that is irrelevant. And –” He broke off suddenly, frowning. “Someone is coming. More than one someone, in fact – I hear voices.” He looked at his henchman. “Position yourselves, and seize them when they appear.”

“No – please –” Ahiru turned her back and started to run after them, but Drosselmeyer caught her from behind and pinned her arms to her sides. “Let go!”

He merely laughed at her protests, and as she struggled in vain to free herself, she heard the approaching voices too, recognizing them just as their owners appeared. Uzura emerged from the undergrowth first, and was seized by the shortest of the hooded men and dragged into the clearing. Fakir and Rue, close behind her, barely had time to react before they too were grabbed from behind and pulled into the meadow. Long-bladed knives were produced and held to their throats, though Uzura’s captor was slower in retrieving his, as her struggling was rather more energetic than that of the other two. Her squirms also resulted in his hood falling down, revealing his identity as Mr. Bookman, the shop owner who’d tried to buy Ahiru’s pendant.

“Fakir! Rue! Uzura!” Ahiru struggled harder and tried to kick Drosselmeyer. “Let them go! Please! Please, don’t hurt them!” Tears started to form in her eyes as she watched her friends fight to get free; the sight of those horrible knives pressed against their throats was too much for her to bear. The fear she’d felt earlier when she’d run from the castle paled in comparison to the terror she was experiencing now with them in danger like this.

“They’ll remain unharmed so long as you obey me.” Drosselmeyer’s grip on her tightened. “But the moment you run towards them, or they try to use their magic, they’re dead. And unlike you, they won’t come back to life afterwards.”

The shock of this statement was enough to make Ahiru go limp and stop struggling for the moment. “You… you know about that?”

“Know? Of course I know about that, little Ahiru.” Drosselmeyer laughed long and loud. “It was I who sealed your lives away in your mother’s pendant, after all. It was… costly, I’m afraid, but well worth the price, for it simplifies certain things for me now. Mr. Bookman here tried to retrieve it so that I would not have to risk setting foot in that castle, but your refusal complicated matters, so we had to change our plans.” He leaned down. “Now, little Ahiru, I am going to release you so that I can cast the magic to open up a doorway through which we’ll go to our new home in some other Series, but remember, you must remain where you are and not try anything, lest your precious friends meet tragic ends. You may bid them farewell, but if you value their lives, make sure your goodbyes are verbal and from this safe distance, eh?”

He let go of her then, and reached into his coat for something. Ahiru turned her head to see him pull out the little clock with the carving of the owl on top that he used to cast his spells, as well as a small jar of red powder. Her heart almost seemed to stop for a moment as he opened up the jar, and the faint traces of a familiar unpleasant smell drifted on the breeze towards her. He smiled at her.

“Usually, I have someone else available to open these things for me, so I haven’t had to do this before.” He reached into the jar and withdrew a handful of the dried dragon’s blood. “It’s rather a different kind of magic I don’t normally have access to, even when I draw upon yours. But there is a way, and it requires the same price as the sealing of your lives did. I regret having to pay it again, but my need is so great that I have little choice.” He tossed the powder into the space between the pillars, and chanted a few words in some language she did not understand. “Besides, this will make it easier to carry you through.” He twisted something on his clock.

Ahiru opened her mouth to ask what he meant, but no words came out. Under her clothes, the pendant trembled against her skin and grew unbearably hot for a moment before becoming as cold as the wintry air in the previous part of the garden. She suddenly found herself unable to breathe – it felt like she was being strangled, and she clutched at her throat as if to pry away invisible hands, her vision blurring and dimming. She thought she could hear voices frantically screaming her name, but they became lost in the silent darkness that soon overtook her. She was dead before her body hit the ground, and it had taken only a matter of seconds for her to die.

“No! Ahiru!” Rue sagged in the grip of the cloaked man that still held her captive. Nearby, Uzura was screaming and squirming ferociously, and a short distance away, closer to where Ahiru lay still and unmoving on the ground, she could see Fakir staring at their fallen friend, his face frozen in abject horror. Tears were sliding down his cheeks, and Rue could feel them building in her own eyes. “You monster!” she shrieked at Drosselmeyer, who was still casting his spell. “How could you do that to her?”

“Oh, how unnecessarily dramatic you all are.” Drosselmeyer gave a bored sigh as he closed the jar and replaced it in his coat. “She’ll be awake soon enough, it isn’t permanent. Calm down.”

“And you think that makes this okay?” Rue struggled harder against her captor, choking back a sob and wondering if she could use magic quickly and discreetly enough to gain the upper hand before Fakir and Uzura could be harmed. “You think it’s a small thing, to do this to her? You think you have the right?”

“I’m amused that you think I care about what you have to say.” Drosselmeyer let out a scornful laugh. “Ah! At last!” A portal like a rippling pool of water had opened up in the archway. “Excellent. I shall go first, with my little niece, then you three are to let go of these children and follow me swiftly.”

Ahiru was beginning to stir, but Drosselmeyer didn’t notice as he strode back over to her. He ungently grasped her under her shoulders and lifted her, and made to pick her up, but she was alive now and able – just barely – to stand on her own, and she resisted him, pushing weakly against him and trying to free herself from his grip. “N-no,” she managed, her voice weak. “L-let me go… no… I don’t want to go…”

“Awake already?” Drosselmeyer frowned and tightened his grip on her, the head of the carved owl atop his clock pressing uncomfortably against her side. “Ah, but no matter, there’s nothing you can do.”

“N-no, I can… I can…” Ahiru struggled, but Drosselmeyer was stronger than she was, even when she wasn’t still recovering from having died, and he dragged her a short ways towards the shimmering portal. She dug her heels into the ground, though, slowing him up as she tried to think of what she could do. She was the only one who could stop him from doing this, and she had to – she had to –

Her gaze dropped as she continued to fight him, and fell on the clock in his hands. A spark of memory lit up her still-foggy mind, and a wild hope surged up inside her. She drew a deep breath, and uttered a silent prayer to anyone or anything listening that she could make this work again, now, when it was so much more important. “I – I don’t think you should do this. I think you should go inside your clock and – and stay there, and never come out! And then your henchmen should run away and never come back either!”

“A futile wish.” Drosselmeyer chuckled. “But then, you always were imagina –”

He stopped talking, a gurgling sound coming from inside his throat. He had no choice but to let go of Ahiru as his body shrank rapidly. He screamed, his voice becoming increasingly high-pitched as he continued to grow smaller. His clock hovered in the air, opened to let him fly in, and then closed with a snap, cutting off the sound of his shrieking. As it fell to the grass, all three of his cloaked servants let go of their hostages and ran as one towards the portal. It shut behind them with another loud pop as the last one disappeared into it.


	19. Chapter 19

Ahiru swayed on her feet. Behind her, Uzura had been dumped rather unceremoniously onto the grass and was sobbing hysterically; as soon as she too was released, Rue rushed over and gathered the little girl into her arms to try and comfort her. Relief that they were safe warred with numb shock at everything that had just happened, and Ahiru found herself feeling dizzy and weak from the exertion of using powerful magic in her already sluggish state. Her knees trembled and then gave out, and she would have fallen back down to the ground if Fakir hadn’t rushed over and caught her in his arms. He gently lowered them both to their knees, and then pulled her close in a tight hug. She was trembling with what he assumed was exhaustion, and he hoped she wouldn’t notice that he was shaking too.

“F-Fakir…” Ahiru lifted her head to look up at him and immediately burst into tears, burying her face in his chest as she cried. It seemed to her to be a delayed reaction to what had transpired, to all the fear she’d experienced since walking into the parlor and seeing her uncle.

His arms tightened around her, and he leaned his head against hers, forgetting that his face was still wet. Luckily, she didn’t seem to notice. “It’s all right,” he murmured. “He’s gone now, he can’t hurt you anymore. It’s over. You defeated him.”

“I – I know, but, but…” Her voice broke and she shook her head. “I was s-so – s-so – so s-scared… I – I thought… I… I d-didn’t w-want any of you to get h-hurt, a-and…” She hiccupped. “H-how did you f-find me, a-anyway?”

“Uzura saw you come in here, and then she met us when we came outside to find you.” He frowned. “Why did you run away?”

“I – I w-was…” Ahiru choked back a sob. “I d-didn’t want h-him to t-take me away, s-so, so I thought if I hid until he w-went away o-or, or s-something…” A fresh wave of tears filled her eyes. “I d-didn’t want to l-leave, I love it here. I was afraid I h-had to go with him…”

He shook his head. “Idiot. We never would’ve let that happen.”

His hand came up to cradle her head, and for a brief moment she forgot how to breathe. Somehow, being held by him like this made her want to cry even harder even as it calmed her; she could already feel herself relaxing into his embrace, and the tears were starting to slow despite the feelings that arose in her heart at the touch of his hand on her hair. It’s warm here, she thought drowsily. Warm and safe. I don’t want to be anywhere else right now.

“He’s right,” Rue said as she walked over with Uzura. Her voice sounded slightly hoarse. “We never would’ve let him just walk out of there with you, there was no need to run away. But either way, you’re here to stay now.”

“Ahiru?” Uzura was still sniffling as she tugged on Ahiru’s sleeve. “Rue said you fell asleep and now you’re fine zura. Is that true zura?”

“Y-yeah. It is.” Ahiru turned her head and gave Uzura a watery smile. “I’m okay, Uzura. And I’m glad you are too. I’m sorry I worried you.”

“It’s okay zura.” Uzura leaned forward and hugged her. “I’m happy you’re all right zura.”

“So am I.” Rue knelt down and wrapped her arms around the three of them. Ahiru’s lower lip trembled, and more tears threatened to spill out of her eyes, but they were not tears of grief or fear. Instead, they were made of pure joy and relief.

They stayed that way for a couple of minutes, and then Rue let go of them and stood up. “As pretty as this garden turned out to be, what do you say we get out of here? I’m sure everyone at the castle is wondering – and worrying – where we are, and I could use some lunch besides.”

“Me too zura!” Uzura let go of Ahiru and stood up. “Let’s go back zura!” She ran off towards the trees, but almost as soon as she had disappeared amongst them, she came running back out into the meadow. She stopped short as soon as she reappeared, and seemed to be thinking hard about something. “Ooooohhhh. I remember zura. Mama told me there was a trick zura. She said so in case I ever found myself in here zura.”

“She must have assumed that Uzura would one day manage to wander in here on her own somehow.” Rue looked faintly amused. “Let’s see if we can find it, Uzura! Tell me what she said!” She ran off to Uzura’s side, but not before retrieving the clock that still lay on the ground.

As Rue hurried off, Ahiru pulled back and knelt on the grass. She wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand, and started in surprise when Fakir leaned forward and took the other one. “Are you feeling better now?” he asked quietly.

Ahiru nodded. “Y-yeah. Th-thank you. H-how about you? Are you okay? I know it must’ve been scary for you too.” She swallowed down a lump in her throat. “I – I was so afraid they were going to hurt you.”

“I – I’m fine.” He smiled at her, but it was a funny, lopsided sort of smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes the way it should have. She knew what it meant: that he was still shaken up by what had happened but cared more about making her feel better. “I was more concerned about you.”

“Silly.” Ahiru smiled back at him, hoping to make him feel better too, as he had done for her. “I still have six more lives. You and Rue and Uzura only have one each, so you were in more danger.”

“He would’ve burned through the rest of them if he’d succeeded in taking you away, though.” Fakir’s expression darkened. “Now we know how you lost that first life, and where you smelled the dragon’s blood before. And I think… I don’t think he realized you replaced the chain, because he assumed you couldn’t access your magic.”

“Huh? Oh…” Ahiru glanced down at where the pendant would normally be visible around her neck. “Y-you’re right. I-I’m glad I hid it today cause even though I knew that shop was gone I was still kinda worried. I don’t know what would’ve happened if he’d seen the new chain.”

“Luckily, we’ll never have to find out.” He gently squeezed her hand. “Come on. Let’s go help them find the way out.”

“O-okay.” Ahiru nodded. “That sounds good, cause I-I’m hungry too, actually.”

Fakir took her other hand then, and pulled her up along with him, letting go only to take hold of her shoulders as she swayed again and almost stumbled into him. “Are you all right to walk? I know you were feeling weak after you –” He paused for a second. “After you woke up.”

“I’m fine, don’t worry.” She smiled up at him. “I probably won’t need help until we get back to the stairs.”

“Hey!” Rue called, emerging from the woods. “Over here! We found the way! You have to go counter-clockwise!”

“Okay!” Ahiru called back. She set off in the right direction, and Fakir followed close behind. They soon rejoined Rue and Uzura, and were on their way back out through the garden.

“It feels a bit like going uphill, doesn’t it?” Rue commented as they left the winter area and returned to autumn. “On the way in, it felt like going downhill.”

“I – I didn’t notice,” Ahiru confessed, blushing. “I guess I was kinda preoccupied.”

“Completely understandable.” Rue turned her head and gave her a sympathetic look. “I don’t think I properly appreciated how lovely this place really is because I was distracted too.”

“I’m sorry.” Ahiru hung her head. “I – I really wasn’t trying to make you worry… I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine.” Rue plucked a fallen leaf out of her hair and tossed it onto the ground to join the rest. “I don’t know what I would’ve done in your situation either. You were scared, and you weren’t thinking straight, and who can blame you?”

“W-well, I guess…” Ahiru opened up her coat and rolled up her sleeves in anticipation of entering the summery area they were about to walk into. “I still feel bad, though.”

“Please don’t.” Rue shook her head. “None of us wants you to.”

“O-okay.” She sighed. “I-I’ll try.”

Ahead of them, Uzura began to bang on her drum as they treaded through the hot, sandy area. It was just beginning to be unbearable when they made it through at last to the springtime section once more and found themselves back under the cherry trees.

“It’s so pretty here.” Ahiru’s expression brightened as they walked through the little dell. “I think I like this one best. There are so many flowers and the trees are so pretty. And it makes me feel happy being here, I don’t know why, I kinda just do, it’s this weird feeling I get. Even earlier I felt a little better when I was going through this part. I wish we could come here more often.”

Rue smiled. “That’d be nice. Oh, but you’ll like the castle gardens in spring too, it’s a bit like this. Did I ever tell you that the reason we have flowers year round in there, even ones that seem to be out of season, is because our gardeners cultivate flowers from all the Related Worlds? There are some that’ll be blooming soon that I bet you’ve never seen before!”

“Really?” Ahiru’s eyes lit up. “I-I can’t wait to see them, then!” She turned to Fakir. “Is that why you – oh!” She giggled, and stood up on her toes so she could pick a cherry blossom petal out of his hair. “You – you’ve got some on you.” She brushed a few more off his shoulders.

“Th-thanks.” He could feel his face turning red. “What were you going to ask me?”

“Oh, right!” They were passing out of the spring area and back into the ordinary forest. “Um, I was going to ask if that’s why you wanted those plant books that time we went to the library.”

“No, I wanted them for –” He stopped, and shook his head. “There was just – something I was curious about. That’s all.”

“Oh.” Ahiru gave him a look that indicated she thought this was suspicious, and he looked away from her, his blush deepening a little.

They came soon enough to the end – or rather, the beginning – of the path, and emerged at the top of the ruined wall. Rue hurried forward to help Uzura climb down safely, while Fakir placed himself between Ahiru and the sheer drop, slipping his arm around her and holding onto the wall. Descending the stairs somehow made her even dizzier than ascending them had, so Ahiru was grateful for his support. She braced herself against the wall with one hand that kept brushing his, and after a while worked up the courage to slide her other arm around Fakir’s waist for extra security. Neither of them noticed the blushes that spread across both their faces at this, nor did they have any idea how reluctant the other one was to let go when they finally reached the bottom of the staircase.

“Bye bye zura.” Uzura turned and waved at the wall as they walked away. It soon shifted to again be off to the side of them, and at a great distance. “I liked it zura. Can we go back sometime zura?”

“Maybe.” Rue squeezed her hand before letting go. “If we’re allowed to. This was a special circumstance, after all.”

“I’m sure Mama will understand zura.” Uzura nodded and began to play on her drum again as they walked back through the flower gardens. “Maybe she’ll take us next time zura!” She brightened as they neared the entrance. “Ooooohhh! Mama! And the kitty zura!”

She took off at a run, and the other three watched her get swept into her mother’s arms as she exited the flower garden. Chrestomanci was indeed there, along with Mr. Katz, and they both looked relieved to see all of them.

“Ah, Miss Ahiru,” Mr. Katz greeted her. “I was concerned when you disappeared. I’m glad to see you’re all safe.”

“Y-yes.” Ahiru bowed her head. “I – I’m so sorry to worry all of you. I – I was just so scared, and I wasn’t thinking, and… and…”

“Mr. Katz tells me that your uncle was here.” Chrestomanci had Uzura balanced on her hip, and was holding one of her tiny hands in hers. “Where is he now?”

“In here.” Rue held out the clock. “He was using this to work his magic, but Ahiru used Performative Speech to seal him in it.”

“Ah, like in class!” Mr. Katz smiled widely. “Excellent work, Miss Ahiru!” He took the clock from Rue and inspected it. “This will go in your safe, I assume?” he asked, directing his question to Chrestomanci.

“Yes.” She nodded. “I trust Ahiru’s magic, but all the same, it is best to take extra precautions. Assumption without action is a foolish course indeed.”

“Um… I think you should put this in there too.” Ahiru swallowed hard as she reached behind her head and unclasped her pendant. “Here.” She held it out to Mr. Katz.

“But why?” Chrestomanci made a puzzled frown. “Is that not a treasured memento of your mother?”

“Y-yes, but…” Ahiru’s lower lip quivered. She felt like crying at the thought of parting with the necklace, but she knew there was no choice. “It – it’s not safe for me to have it. My – my uncle, he – he sealed all my lives in there, a-and I think that’s how he was able to use one to open a gate to another world just now.” Her hand shook at the memory. “I – I don’t think I should be wearing it anymore, what if someone else tries the same thing?”

“Oh my. Indeed.” Chrestomanci nodded, and Mr. Katz took the pendant from her. “I see I should have closely inspected it sooner. Yes. It will be safe from those who would seek to steal your lives from you in the future once I have locked it away. You will still be able to lose lives if you are fatally injured, but no one else will be able to use them as he did. Do not worry.”

“Th-thank you.” Ahiru wiped at her eyes. It was a wrench to lose one of the only things she had of her parents, but she felt safer already knowing that no one could ever again do to her what her uncle had done in that garden. “U-um, so, what happened in the village? Is everyone there okay?”

“Yes.” Chrestomanci nodded, even as she bent her head to kiss Uzura’s forehead. “There were a few minor injuries, and much property damage, but no loss of life.” She looked straight into Ahiru’s eyes. “One of the criminals behind it was caught, and he confessed to the reasons why. It seems it was a diversion orchestrated by your uncle, so that he could slip into this castle while I was otherwise occupied and steal you away.”

“What?” Ahiru stared at her. “W-well, he did mention not wanting to come in here, that’s why that creepy Mr. Bookman tried to buy the pendant from me, but I don’t understand why. If he really thought he could legally take me away like he said to Fakir and Rue, why would he need to do that and hurt more people?”

“Because there was no legality to his claim at all.” Mr. Katz’s mustache twitched. “When he left you behind in that orphanage, it was because we – as well as his enemies – were closing in on him, though we did not know his identity at the time. It was only today that we confirmed that the leader of a smuggling ring we have been trying to shut down – you may have heard our discussions on the matter at dinner from time to time – was in fact your uncle. He laid low for those years you were in the orphanage, hiding in some other world or series, and only became active again very recently.”

“What?” Ahiru’s jaw dropped, and even Fakir and Rue looked shocked.

“It is true.” Chrestomanci nodded. “It was his mansion that Mr. Katz’s contacts in your former hometown attempted to investigate for us. As our efforts dragged on, we began to suspect your uncle of having been connected in some way, but did not wish to speak of it to you, because it seemed that it would be hard on you to hear such things about a deceased relative in whose care you once had been.”

“N-no, I… I would’ve…” Ahiru shook her head. “I – I was always scared of him, and he was never nice to me… a-and this makes so many things I saw back then make sense. It-it’s really not that surprising, now that I think about it…”

“Still…” Chrestomanci let go of Uzura’s hand and laid hers on Ahiru’s cheek. “I am sorry for what you have been through at his hands. It is my hope that we have been a kinder family for you than he has been.”

“Oh yes!” Ahiru nodded vigorously. “Th-that’s why I was so scared to leave! I didn’t want to go back with him and live in his scary mansion and be separated from all of you.” She smiled, and there were more happy tears in her eyes. “I love it here. Th-thank you so much, for taking me in, and – and being so wonderful. All of you.”

“It is our pleasure, I assure you.” Chrestomanci smiled, and set Uzura down. “Now then, are you hungry? I think it is past time all of us had lunch.”

A chorus of voices expressed their assent, and so a table and chairs and large quantities of food were swiftly summoned from inside the castle. Ahiru would later recall that it tasted better than any other meal she had ever had, and that up to that point in her life she had never felt happier or more relaxed than she did as she enjoyed it. It was easy to see why: it was, after all, the first time she had ever felt truly secure in the knowledge that she was there to stay, that no one could take her away from the people she cared so very much about.

She was, at last, home.


End file.
